Patient room and bed management apparatus and system

• US 8,799,011 B2
• Filed: 02/24/2010
• Issued: 08/05/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 02/19/2010
• Status: Expired due to Fees

• Current Assignee: Hill-Rom Services Incorporated (Baxter International Inc.)
• Original Assignee: Hill-Rom Services Incorporated (Baxter International Inc.)
• Inventors: Wilson, Bradley T., Pesot, Whitney W., Vigneron, Katherine J., McCleerey, Michelle E., Saucier, Christian
• Primary Examiner(s): NGUYEN, TRAN N
• Application Number:
  US12/711,912
• Publication Number:
  US 20110208541A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,623 Days
• Field of Search: 705/2
• US Class Current: 705/2
• CPC Class Codes: A61B 5/002 Monitoring the patient using a local or closed circuit, e.g. in a room or building A61B5/0017 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 12/00 Accommodation for nursing, e.g. in hospitals, not covered by groups A61G1/00 - A61G11/00, e.g. trolleys for transport of medicaments or food service or tea-tables, trolleys or wagons A47B31/00; Prescription lists
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 2203/44 for weight
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 2205/60 using magnetic or electronic identifications, e.g. chips, RFID, electronic tags
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 7/005 tiltable around transverse horizontal axis, e.g. for Trendelenburg position rocking beds for physical therapy A61H1/003; hanging patient inclined downwardly for drawing him out A61H2203/0493
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 7/018 Control or drive mechanisms
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 7/0507 Side-rails
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 7/0524 characterised by integrated accessories, e.g. bed control means, nurse call or reading lights
• CPC Class Codes: A61G 7/0527 Weighing devices
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 10/60 for patient-specific data, e.g. for electronic patient records
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/20 for the management or administration of healthcare resources or facilities, e.g. managing hospital staff or surgery rooms
• CPC Class Codes: G16H 40/63 for local operation

Abstract

A patient room and bed management apparatus and system detects changes in a patient'"'"'s status and updates the status of a room of a healthcare facility associated with the patient. The system may receive the patient status information from a remote system, such as a health information system used by a healthcare facility. The patient room and bed management system may determine one or more actions to be performed by a bed in the patient'"'"'s room. The system may determine one or more actions to be performed by a caregiver or other staff person of the healthcare facility. The actions to be performed by the bed or staff person may be triggered by a change in status of the patient, the patient'"'"'s bed, or the patient'"'"'s room. The actions to be performed may be electronically communicated to the bed, to one or more remote displays, and/or to communication devices associated with staff persons of the healthcare facility.

The patient room and bed management apparatus and system may include a user interface module that is not mounted to the patient'"'"'s bed. A list of actions to be performed by a staff person in the patient'"'"'s room, the status of the patient, the status of the patient'"'"'s room, and/or the status of the patient'"'"'s bed, may be displayed and updated electronically at the user interface module. The user interface module may also provide bed controls that allow a staff person to initiate an electronically-controlled function of the bed from the user interface module.

Claims

1. A bed system comprising

a bed having a plurality of electronically-controllable functions and a bed identifier, and

a bed control system connected to the bed and configured to control one or more of the electronically-controllable functions of the bed, the bed controller comprising

memory in which data and computer-executable instructions are stored,

a communications interface configured to couple the bed system to a health information system of a healthcare facility, and

processor circuitry configured to execute the computer-executable instructions to receive via the communications interface a patient status signal representative of patient status information from the health information system, the patient status information indicating a status of a patient in the healthcare facility, and send a control signal to the bed to cause the bed to automatically without user intervention initiate one of the electronically-controlled functions performed by the bed in response to the patient status signal;

wherein the patient status signal includes an admission, discharge and transfer (ADT) indicator, the bed has a built-in weigh scale, and the bed zeros the weigh scale in response to the patient status signal.

2. The bed system of claim 1, wherein the patient status signal indicates that the patient has been discharged from the healthcare facility.

3. A healthcare communication system comprising

memory in which data and computer-executable instructions are stored,

a communications interface, and

processor circuitry configured to execute the computer-executable instructions to:

receive via the communications interface a patient status signal representative of patient status information generated at a health information system of a healthcare facility, the patient status signal indicating a status of a patient in the healthcare facility,

determine, based on the patient status signal, a status of a room in the healthcare facility, the room having therein a bed associated with the patient,

send via the communications interface a room status signal indicating the status of the room to a user interface device located in the patient room to cause the user interface device to indicate the status of the room,

generate a list of actions to be performed by a person associated with the healthcare facility in the room associated with the patient, the list of actions being generated in accordance with the room status, the person being someone other than the patient, the list of actions including at least one bed-related activity to be performed by the bed and at least one room-related activity to be performed by the person, and

send via the communications interface the list of actions to an input/output device.

4. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the status of the patient is one of admitted, transferred, or discharged.

5. The healthcare communication system of claim 4, wherein the status of the room is one of clean, needs cleaning, and ready for new patient.

6. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the list of actions includes at least one patient-related activity.

7. The healthcare communication system of claim 6, wherein the at least one patient-related activity includes at least one of taking patient'"'"'s temperature, giving patient a pillow, and giving patient a garment.

8. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the processor circuitry is configured to execute computer-executable instructions to receive user input at the user interface device, and the user input relates to at least one of a room status, a patient status and a bed status.

9. The healthcare communication system of claim 8, wherein the processor circuitry is configured to execute computer-executable instructions to send via the communications interface a signal indicative of the user input to the health information system of the healthcare facility.

10. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the at least one bed-related activity relates to at least one of raising the bed siderails, setting a bed brake, placing the bed in a low position, arming or disarming a bed patient position monitoring (PPM) system, arming or disarming a head of bed angle monitoring system, placing sheets on the bed, and zeroing a weigh scale of the bed.

11. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the at least one room-related activity relates to at least one of clean the room, remove obstructions to room exit, prepare bed for new patient, indicate whether room preparations are complete, and indicate whether a caregiver'"'"'s round is complete.

12. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the processor circuitry is configured to execute computer-executable instructions to send via the communications interface a signal to the bed to cause the bed to execute an electronically-controlled bed function.

13. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the processor circuitry is configured to execute computer-executable instructions to send via the communications interface an indication of the room status to a mobile device of a person associated with the facility.

14. The healthcare communication system of claim 3, wherein the processor circuitry is configured to execute computer-executable instructions to send via the communications interface an indication of the room status to an output device located outside the patient'"'"'s room.