From the Desk of Paul:
Most organizations have implemented some process changes as it relates to who is allowed to enter their facility. Most are requiring facemasks and social distancing and many are requiring temperature checks for staff, patients and patrons prior to allowing people to enter their facility. A large number of these organizations are using internal staff or temporary employees armed with digital thermometers and a questionnaire to attempt to minimize exposure to others inside the facility. Unfortunately, these organizations are dealing with increased staff and Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) costs in an already difficult financial situation. Also, there is little protection for those humans conducting the screening. I suppose if one of the “screeners” is exposed, then it’s just “next man/woman up” to fill the spot vacated by someone who is now required to quarantine.
The intent of nearly all of these solutions boils down to minimizing exposure, but these solutions are far from ideal. Besides the increases in cost, these solutions that include human screeners also create some terrible inefficiencies. When the organization uses internal staff for this, there is an associated opportunity cost that may not show up in the accounting. That screener would normally be doing another job and those responsibilities didn’t just vanish. Someone else will have to fill those responsibilities and there isn’t always enough budget, given the financial difficulties that COVID-19 has already created, to hire someone else for those responsibilities. Either those responsibilities get neglected or other staff members are tasked with filling in the gaps. Temporary employees as part of the solution may be even more expensive. I recently had one dentist express some heartburn with paying someone to sit at the front door and wait for dental patients to arrive, knowing that the human resource was only going to be 50-70% utilized for the time he was paying for.
There is a better solution! ITG has worked with a partner company in the security/surveillance sector to provide a solution that was developed with some existing technology. The Thermal Detection Solution (TDS) provided by ITG can use artificial intelligence to scan for a mask as well as take a temperature in a contactless environment. The unit is extremely fast and measures temperature to within .1 degrees of accuracy. The unit can be completely managed using real-time video and two-way audio from anywhere in the facility where a staff member is connected to the same network as the TDS. The management software allows the staff member to provide the screening questionnaire or at least verify that the patient has picked up the paper copy and completed it with all the correct answers before admitting the person to the facility. All of this occurs with no exposure to the staff member! Furthermore, the staff member is able to continue working from his or her own desk, which allows for other tasks to be completed between screenings. The software simply lets the staff member know when there is someone present for screening. Did I mention the best part? The cost of this solution is about the equivalent of a decent laptop! That allows those organizations using this solution to see a return on their investment in as little as 3-4 weeks! I think we can all agree that “our new norm” is going to last much longer than 3-4 weeks, unfortunately.
To summarize, the TDS solves the screening problem by reducing exposure, reducing costs and reducing inefficiencies. For videos, whitepapers and other information on this solution, check out www.itghealthcare.com/TDS.
Paul Meadows,
President/CEO
