Hospitals and Data Collection on Handheld PDAs

My wife and I spent Saturday evening visiting a friend in the hospital here in Boise. While in the hospital I quickly became distracted by the nurse. Not the nurse specifically, but by the handheld PDA she was carrying around. She was doing the following:

1. Scanning a bar code on the wrist band of the patient
2. Scanning a bar code on the applied medicine
3. Capturing the date and time stamp on the handheld computer
4. Synchronizing the data to an enterprise software application
5. The collected data activates business rules
6. The business rules prompt the user with questions
7. The system alerts user if there is a problem with the treatment or treatment schedule
8. Ask for response to alert

This was a fascinating example of a handheld PDA and a mobile data collection system that is integrated with an enterprise database. These same 8 steps can be implemented with many different assets. Let's consider a large piece of manufacturing equipment and a plant maintenance technician:

1. Scan a bar code on the side of the equipment
2. Scan a maintenance service bar code to designate the service you are performing
3. Capture date and time stamp on the handheld computer
4. Synchronize the data with your Asset Tracking or CMMS system
5. The collected data activates business rules
6. The system's business rules prompt you with questions about the service
7. The system sends you service alerts based upon stored data
8. You respond to the alert and verify you read it

These 2 data collection systems work the same from a mobile data collection technology perspective, but serve 2 completely different industries.

MobileDataforce develops mobile software applications that help companies improve their field services operations.