Track: Healthcare Systems
Abstract
Airborne infectious isolation rooms are a nursing barrier between an infectious patient and a health care worker. The high prevalence of tuberculosis with multidrug resistant Tuberculosis at 480 000 in the 2017 global TB report, makes Airborne Infectious Isolation Rooms (AIIRs) a health priority in the health sector. This paper presents the performance of Airborne infectious isolation rooms using Supervisory control and Data Acquisition and IoT. The performance of 20 AIIRs are evaluated over 12 months. Two AIIRs fitted with Supervisory Control and Data Aquisition equipment using the Internet of things (IoT) technology are evaluated and compared to standard AIIRs and the performance evaluated for this period. The SCADA system is linked to a secondary extraction system as well as local and remote smart alarms. The various rooms are interogated using both scada and Tracer gas analysis to analyse and understand the performance of an Airborne infectious isolation room over various conditions in a South African context.
The results of this research show that SCADA and IoT technology when applied to Isolation rooms improve the performance of the AIIR and improve the overall life cycle of the room . The overall human component to maintenance is reduced significanly by the online data. The cost of installation and maintenace of electronics is significantly reduced by emerging technology. The cost of IoT technology when compared to expensive PLCs and proprietry systems reduces the construction costs of AIIRs with smart alarms and monitoring. Raspberry pi and Arduino platforms have simplified the user interfaces and configuration requirements. The technology required for smart platforms is now plug and play, simple and easy for the struggling and pressurised maintenance team.
This paper explores AIIR design, the use of IOT technology and addresses common points of failure of negative pressure rooms after comissioning by the project team. The research aims at providing a cost effective solution to protecting health care workers exposed to AIIRs. The use of smart phones, APPS and IoT is apart of our modern work and this research embraces this technology to find a cost effective improvemnt for isolation rooms.
The results show a marked improvement of the AIIRS fitted with smart technology when compared to other AIIRs functioning on the convential technology without IoT.
This research aapplies modern technology of IoT to Airborne infectious Isolation rooms for an improved and safe environment for Health Care Workers.