Automatic identification for spot measurements
First Claim
1. A patient monitoring system for monitoring physiological functions of each of a plurality of patients, the system comprising:
- a plurality of identification devices, each associated with one of a corresponding one of a plurality of patients including;
an electronic identification code memory which stores a patient identification code which identifies the corresponding to one of the patients, anda patient body-coupled communication device capacitively coupled with the corresponding patient which communicates the identification code via near field communications; and
a medical device including;
a sensor which spot measures a physiological function of each of a plurality of patients;
a medical device body-coupled communication device which capacitively couples with each patient during spot measuring and automatically reads the respective patient identification codes via near field communications and automatically associates physiological function measurements with the patient identification code of the corresponding patient;
anda memory which stores the associated physiological functional measurements and patient identification codes.
1 Assignment
0 Petitions
Accused Products
Abstract
A patient monitoring system (8) monitors physiological functions of a plurality of patients (12). Each clinician (10) and each patient (12) has an associated identification device (20, 22), which each includes an identification code corresponding to respective clinician and patient. Each identification device (20, 22) includes a respective body-coupled communication device (24, 26) for communicating the identification code to a medical device (14). The clinician (10) activates the medical device (14) which includes a body-coupled communication device (40) including an ID reader (42). The ID reader (42) scans the area to detect whether the clinician identification is present. After the clinician'"'"'s identification code is read, the medical device (14) is ready to take measurements. The clinician (10) takes the medical device (14) to the patient (12). The ID reader (42) scans the area to detect the patient identification code. The result of the measurement along with the patient identification code is stored in a medical device memory (56) and later transferred to a patient record in a hospital database (70).
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Citations
16 Claims
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1. A patient monitoring system for monitoring physiological functions of each of a plurality of patients, the system comprising:
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a plurality of identification devices, each associated with one of a corresponding one of a plurality of patients including; an electronic identification code memory which stores a patient identification code which identifies the corresponding to one of the patients, and a patient body-coupled communication device capacitively coupled with the corresponding patient which communicates the identification code via near field communications; and a medical device including; a sensor which spot measures a physiological function of each of a plurality of patients; a medical device body-coupled communication device which capacitively couples with each patient during spot measuring and automatically reads the respective patient identification codes via near field communications and automatically associates physiological function measurements with the patient identification code of the corresponding patient; and a memory which stores the associated physiological functional measurements and patient identification codes. - View Dependent Claims (2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
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8. A method for monitoring a plurality of patients, comprising:
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capacitively coupling patient wireless identification devices to each of a plurality of patients, each patient identification device communicating via near field communications and being encoded with an electronic patient identification code that uniquely identifies the patient and communicates the patient identification code via near field body coupled communications; capacitively coupling clinician wireless identification devices to each of a plurality of clinicians, each clinician identification device communicating via near field communications and being encoded with an electronic clinician identification code that uniquely identifies the clinician and communicates the clinician identification code via the near field body coupled communications; capacitively coupling the clinician with a medical monitoring device and communicating the clinician identification code using a medical device to the medical monitoring device via near field communications; capacitively coupling the medical monitoring device with each one of the patients, communicating the patient identification code of each patient to which the medical monitoring device is capacitively coupled via the body coupling communications and spot measuring a physiological function of each patient with the medical device; automatically communicating the patient identification code of each patient wireless identification device to the medical monitor via the near field communications in conjunction with the spot measuring of each patient and associating each patient identification code with the spot measurement of the corresponding patient; storing the spot measurements and the patient and clinician identification codes in a measurement memory in the medical monitoring device; and downloading the stored spot measurements and identifications codes to a database. - View Dependent Claims (9, 10, 11, 12)
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13. A patient monitoring system for monitoring physiological functions of each of a plurality of patients, the system comprising:
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a clinician identification device including; an electronic clinician identification code memory which stores the clinician identification code, and a clinician body-coupled communication device which communicates the clinician identification code of a clinician to whom it is capacitively coupled via near field communications; a patient identification device including; an electronic patient identification code memory which stores a patient identification code, and a patient body-coupled communication device which communicates the patient identification code of a patient with whom it is capacitively coupled via body coupled communications; and a medical device including; a medical device body-coupled communication device which automatically receives respective communicated identification codes via body coupled communications from a clinician or patient to whom it is capacitively coupled; a sensor which spot measures a physiological function of each of a plurality of patients; a memory which stores results of spot measurements measured by the sensor in conjunction with the patient identification code corresponding to each spot measurement and the clinician code of the clinician that used the medical device to make each spot measurement; and a communication interface which transfers the stored sport measurements, the stored patient identification codes, and the stored clinician identification codes to a hospital database.
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14. A spot measurement device for measuring a physiological function of a plurality of patients, the device comprising:
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a sensor which measures at least one physiological function of a patient; a body-coupled communication device which automatically electronically receives a patient identification code from the patient via near field communications contemporaneously with measuring the physiological function of a patient with whom it is capacitively coupled; and a memory which stores data indicative of the measured physiological function associated with the contemporaneously received patient identification code. - View Dependent Claims (15, 16)
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Specification