A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste
Waste generated by health care activities includes a broad range of materials, from used needles and syringes to soiled dressings, body parts, diagnostic samples, medical devices and radioactive materials. As a result of poor practice and large volumes, only a very small percentage ofmedical waste i...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Croatian Communications and Information Society (CCIS)
2016-03-01
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| Series: | Journal of Communications Software and Systems |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://jcomss.fesb.unist.hr/index.php/jcomss/article/view/91 |
| _version_ | 1811294454549577728 |
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| author | Eleftheria Katsiri Konstantinos Moschou |
| author_facet | Eleftheria Katsiri Konstantinos Moschou |
| author_sort | Eleftheria Katsiri |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Waste generated by health care activities includes a broad range of materials, from used needles and syringes to soiled dressings, body parts, diagnostic samples, medical devices and radioactive materials. As a result of poor practice and large volumes, only a very small percentage ofmedical waste is actually disposed of properly in final reception units while the rest is unaccounted for potentially exposing the community at large to infection, toxic effects and injuries, and risking polluting the environment.This paper discusses, Greenactions, a novel Pervasive Computing system for the remote end-to-end management of hazardous medical waste. Greenactions provides real-time trace-ability for 100% of medical waste, by continually monitoring the full life cycle of each waste container, from their delivery to the hospitals, through to their collection and disposal, and providing remedial action in real-time, whenever an incident occurs. This is achieved by employing both fixed and handheld RFID and sensortechnology, supported by a state-machine model that knows at any time the current and next state of each waste container. Deployed together with a small fleet of appropriately modified vehicles for waste collection, Greenactions provides an integrated solution can be applied in any waste collection and tracking scenario, without requiring any costly, proprietary infrastructure thus alleviating the burden of medical waste management fromhealth-care units. A prototype system was developed using open source technology that is ready to be deployed to pilot healthcare units in Athens, while a set of KPIs were implemented for evaluating the efficiency of the system. |
| first_indexed | 2024-04-13T05:17:45Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c191fc4207b246eb87ac316e6b582e73 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 1845-6421 1846-6079 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-04-13T05:17:45Z |
| publishDate | 2016-03-01 |
| publisher | Croatian Communications and Information Society (CCIS) |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Journal of Communications Software and Systems |
| spelling | doaj.art-c191fc4207b246eb87ac316e6b582e732022-12-22T03:00:50ZengCroatian Communications and Information Society (CCIS)Journal of Communications Software and Systems1845-64211846-60792016-03-011215366A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital wasteEleftheria KatsiriKonstantinos MoschouWaste generated by health care activities includes a broad range of materials, from used needles and syringes to soiled dressings, body parts, diagnostic samples, medical devices and radioactive materials. As a result of poor practice and large volumes, only a very small percentage ofmedical waste is actually disposed of properly in final reception units while the rest is unaccounted for potentially exposing the community at large to infection, toxic effects and injuries, and risking polluting the environment.This paper discusses, Greenactions, a novel Pervasive Computing system for the remote end-to-end management of hazardous medical waste. Greenactions provides real-time trace-ability for 100% of medical waste, by continually monitoring the full life cycle of each waste container, from their delivery to the hospitals, through to their collection and disposal, and providing remedial action in real-time, whenever an incident occurs. This is achieved by employing both fixed and handheld RFID and sensortechnology, supported by a state-machine model that knows at any time the current and next state of each waste container. Deployed together with a small fleet of appropriately modified vehicles for waste collection, Greenactions provides an integrated solution can be applied in any waste collection and tracking scenario, without requiring any costly, proprietary infrastructure thus alleviating the burden of medical waste management fromhealth-care units. A prototype system was developed using open source technology that is ready to be deployed to pilot healthcare units in Athens, while a set of KPIs were implemented for evaluating the efficiency of the system.https://jcomss.fesb.unist.hr/index.php/jcomss/article/view/91pervasive healthcarerfidsensor networksremote monitoringdistributed systemsevent-based middleware |
| spellingShingle | Eleftheria Katsiri Konstantinos Moschou A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste Journal of Communications Software and Systems pervasive healthcare rfid sensor networks remote monitoring distributed systems event-based middleware |
| title | A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| title_full | A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| title_fullStr | A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| title_full_unstemmed | A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| title_short | A pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| title_sort | pervasive computing system for the remote management of hospital waste |
| topic | pervasive healthcare rfid sensor networks remote monitoring distributed systems event-based middleware |
| url | https://jcomss.fesb.unist.hr/index.php/jcomss/article/view/91 |
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