The Role Of RFID In The Healthcare Industry

Radio frequency identification (RFID) can help track patients and record their readings, track equipment, and employee location in the hospital. (Larsen, Marc G. 2012) Radio frequency identification is a technology that captures data using electric or magnetic fields at radio frequencies. Depending on the type of radio frequency identification that is being used an individual can be tracked any where from 10 feet away to 300 feet away, this will allow for both patients and staff to be tracked and or monitored. The three main things radio frequency identification is used for is tracking, monitoring, and identification. This technology can also help improve speed of lab test and monitoring and logging of temperature for refrigerated storage. (McGrady, Elizabeth. 2012)

RFID systems are currently being used in manufacturing plants to track parts, stay informed of work in progress, reduce product defects, increase throughput, and manage production of given products. Big name retailers such as Best Buy, Metro, Target, Albertson’s, Hewlett Packard, and Wal-Mart are leading the way in implementing RFID systems. These retailers recognize the need to improve inventory efficiency, ensure products are available to customers as needed, decrease theft, and cut down on costs associated with tracking and processing inventory.

The technology company, Three Square, has begun implanting RFID chips, or radio-frequency transponder systems between employee’s thumb and index finger. Although micro chipping has been done before, the purpose is completely new, to America at least. The other company that has tried this before is the Swedish company BioHax International. Employees are now able to clock into work and pay for their meals digitally, with the swipe of their hand. "We foresee the use of RFID technology to drive everything from making purchases in our office break room market, opening doors, use of copy machines, logging into our office computers, unlocking phones, sharing business cards, storing medical/health information, and used as payment at other RFID terminals,"

The RFID is considered a significant improvement over the conventional barcode, which needs to be read by scanners in "line-of-sight" fashion and can be stripped away if the paper product labels get ripped or damaged. RFID can also facilitate inter-organizational E-commerce initiatives such as continuous replenishment or vendor-managed inventories (Smaros and Holmstrom, 2000).

The RFID system will open new sales opportunities to larger markets such as the Department of Defense (DoD) and Wal-Mart. Who are now demanding that RFID tracking as a condition of contracting.

One of the main and most controversial issues with the RFID chip is that it poses as an invasion of privacy (Freeman, 2007). According to Freeman, “security and privacy experts agree any new technology is always one step ahead of their best possible efforts to secure it.

I agree with you that in the medical field it is imperative that RFID tags be placed on equipment, access badges, laptop computers, and any other valuable assets. Being able to track medical equipment can save organizations money as lost or stolen equipment can be costly to replace. Additionally, it is important to have the ability to track badges as they provide employees with access to different departments of a hospital or facility which if misplaced or stolen can result in a breach of security. Furthermore, an employee laptop may have confidential patient information on it, therefore, having the ability to track such equipment is invaluable. Ultimately, the implementation of RFID tags provides several benefits to the hospital that not only

This will reduce the risks of medication errors that can seriously the harm patients, and cost the healthcare organization lots of money in order to compensate the patient, and to provide new drug dosage. Also, tis technology will help reduce the number of counterfeit prescription drugs that are given to the patients for a sick leave in the healthcare organizations. It is like mass sterilization of the prescription drugs where it ensures that each prescription is credible to use by the patient. The product will have a unique number to each prescription drug in order to record the to record information about all transactions involving the product. Overall, track and trace prescription drugs using RFID technology help in improving patient safety in and out side the healthcare

Another side of this issue deals with the cons of getting an RFID implant. With any new technology, it takes a while to work out all the bugs and kinks. When putting so much information and dependence on a single chip it makes it a perfect target for hackers. In addition, if the information is writable or readable, there is also the likelihood of impersonation or data corruption(6). It is easy to hijack data off of an RFID chip. Anyone with an RFID scanner can connect to the implant and access the signal information and intercept the code that is being broadcast. This means anyone with a scanner can easily access and scan implants without anyone realizing it and steal their banking information and other identification information in a split second. Digital mimicry is a real-world likelihood, meaning

RFID is a technology which has made a major impact in the growth of every industry in their respective fields. Healthcare is one of the major users of RFID which has given their industry some reputation amongst others. But this technology is like a double gamer where the benefits of this technology are accompanied by a few issues in violating the privacy too. The threats involved in violating the privacy could be unauthorised access to data, misuse of patient’s information and also having these chips on a patient it could be easy for an unauthorized personal to read the tags since the patients won’t be too sensitive to the radio signals. These threats have violated the privacy rights (Privacyrights.org, 2003). Since these threats started to

The website that I found list some interesting pros and cons about the RFID chip. It mention about how the chip could be used to track pets, which I've never really considered before. But the main con was that there very easy to get your hands on and unauthorized users with scanners can gain access to sensitive information fairly

The overarching fear as it relates to RFID technology is privacy. Quite often, the RFID trackers in retail goods remain active from manufacture to the time they are disposed of or recycled. This means that if the proper

With negatives about any technology there are always positives surrounding it as well. Tagging can be implemented into any hospital or medical field saving lives and money. Critical medical information can be stored on chips imbedded into patients, such as food and drug allergies and any other illnesses or diseases present in a patient giving anyone treating the patient instant access to this vital information. By having it stored on the chip this drastically reduces the chances of giving a patient something they are allergic to or mistreating the patient for a specific illness. Not only can these chips be used on the patients themselves, but these chips are being used on the medical equipment. At Vanderbilt Children’s Hospital in Nashville, TN tagging was implemented on all mobile equipment, they believe that, ”the use of RFID tags has saved them as

RFID, or radio frequency identification, is the new system that is replacing the use of barcodes. RFID tags allow users to more quickly obtain information from the object that the RFID tag

RFID technology is not only used at gas stations, restaurants, and department but also at