U.S. patent application number 13/739329 was filed with the patent office on 2014-07-17 for medical storage cabinet with rfid inventory.
This patent application is currently assigned to S&S X-Ray Products, Inc.. The applicant listed for this patent is Norman A. Shoenfeld. Invention is credited to Norman A. Shoenfeld.
Application Number | 20140197236 13/739329 |
Document ID | / |
Family ID | 51031652 |
Filed Date | 2014-07-17 |
United States Patent
Application |
20140197236 |
Kind Code |
A1 |
Shoenfeld; Norman A. |
July 17, 2014 |
MEDICAL STORAGE CABINET WITH RFID INVENTORY
Abstract
A medication and/or medical supplies storage cabinet of
all-steel construction has an RFID transducer or reader with an
antenna array (i.e., an antenna or series of antennas) carried on a
vertical elevator at the rear of the cabinet's metal shelves and
drawers. The metal shelves, sides and back of the cabinet define
successive compartments in which RFID-tagged item are stored. The
vertical elevator may have a drive motor, e.g., gear-motor
controlled by a computer associated with the cabinet. There may be
a wall or window of a suitable radiolucent material at the rear of
the cabinet to permit the RFID energy to radiate between the RFID
antenna array and any RFID-tagged inventory items contained in the
respective compartments or drawers.
Inventors: |
Shoenfeld; Norman A.;
(Cypress, TX) |
|
Applicant: |
Name |
City |
State |
Country |
Type |
Shoenfeld; Norman A. |
Cypress |
TX |
US |
|
|
Assignee: |
S&S X-Ray Products,
Inc.
|
Family ID: |
51031652 |
Appl. No.: |
13/739329 |
Filed: |
January 11, 2013 |
Current U.S.
Class: |
235/385 |
Current CPC
Class: |
G16H 20/13 20180101;
G07F 17/0092 20130101; A61G 12/001 20130101; G06Q 90/00 20130101;
G16H 40/67 20180101 |
Class at
Publication: |
235/385 |
International
Class: |
G06Q 90/00 20060101
G06Q090/00 |
Claims
1. Medical storage cabinet comprising a frame, side walls, a top, a
base, a back, a plurality of horizontal shelves arranged one above
another in said cabinet wherein successive ones of said shelves
define between them respective storage compartments in which may be
stored a plurality of RFID-tagged items; and for each compartment
an access door disposed at a front side of the cabinet; wherein the
side walls, top, base, back, shelves and doors are formed of steel;
an RFID inventory interrogation and data collection arrangement
within said cabinet, including an RFID transducer having an antenna
array capable of emitting an RFID interrogate signal and capable of
receiving from said RFID tagged items RFID response signals, a
vertical elevator disposed within said cabinet at a rear of said
shelves, and on which said RFID antenna array is mounted, and a
drive arrangement for controllably driving said elevator up and
down to move said RFID antenna array to a position aligned with a
selected one of said compartments; and means controlling the RFID
transducer to cause same to interrogate the RFID-tagged items
within the selected compartment and to interpret the RFID response
signals received from said RFID-tagged items.
2. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said
means controlling the RFID transducer includes a suitably
programmed computer connected by a wire or wireless connection to
said RFID transceiver and to said drive arrangement.
4. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said at
least one of said compartments includes a plurality of locking
drawers formed of steel.
5. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 4 wherein each of
said drawers has a rear wall at a distal end that is positioned
adjacent the back wall of the cabinet when the drawer is pushed
closed, and said distal wall is at least partly formed of a
radiolucent material that permits the RFID interrogate and response
signals to penetrate therethrough.
5. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said
vertical elevator includes a vertical slide oriented vertically at
the back of said cabinet, with said RFID antenna array being
mounted on said slide, and wherein said drive arrangement includes
a drive motor selected from a group consisting of a servomotor, a
DC gearmotor, an AC gearmotor, and a stepper motor.
6. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said
vertical elevator includes an indexed belt oriented vertically at
the back wall of said cabinet, with said RFID antenna array being
mounted on said belt, and wherein said drive arrangement includes a
drive motor selected from a group consisting of a servomotor, a DC
gearmotor, an AC gearmotor, and a stepper motor.
7. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein the
back of said cabinet includes for each said compartment a window
formed of a radiolucent material permitting the RFID interrogate
and response signals to penetrate therethrough.
8. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said
drive arrangement is adapted to position said RFID transceiver at a
plurality of positions at each selected one of said
compartments.
9. The medical storage cabinet according to claim 1 wherein said
antenna array comprises a plurality of antenna boards disposed side
to side to occupy substantially the width of the shelf of the
associated compartment.
Description
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
[0001] This invention relates to cabinets for storing and
dispensing prescription medical items and medical and hospital
supplies, which can be free standing, mounted on rollers, or built
into a wall, for providing practitioners with access to the
medications and other items. The invention is also concerned with a
cabinet made of steel or other electrically conductive material,
which may be radiopaque, and provided with a built-in RFID (Radio
Frequency Identification) transducer for interrogating RFID-tagged
inventory items within the cabinet, and reading the RFID responses
from such items.
[0002] Many medical supply items, e.g., syringes, bandages and
dressings, disinfectants, catheters, and patient medications, need
to be available to health practitioners in the places where the
patient is located. At the same time, it is important for the
hospital supply technicians and pharmacy technicians to be aware of
the inventory levels of items in the supply cabinets throughout the
facility, so that they will be properly stocked, and when the items
are needed they can be given without delay to the patient. In some
cases, the identification of items within the cabinet, and the
number of each such item can be discerned automatically, e.g., by
reading RFID tags that are attached to the items or incorporated
into the packaging of the item.
[0003] In most cases, steel cabinets are preferred because of their
durability and reasonable price. However, where the cabinets and
the shelves and compartments are formed of steel, the low-level RF
signals used to interrogate the RFID tags do not penetrate into the
compartments between shelves; and the low-level RF signals returned
from RFID tags on the items in the cabinets do not pass out through
the metal walls and shelves. When the cabinets are made of a
non-metal, i.e., plastic or synthetic material, the RF signals can
reach between the RF transducer or reader and the inventory items,
but it is not possible to know what items are stored in which
compartments. Moreover, in cabinet arrangements in which the RFID
reader or transducer is located in a fixed location in or on a
cabinet, the reflections of signals within the cabinet creates dead
zones that make it difficult to capture returns from each and every
one of the inventory items.
[0004] These cabinets may have electronic locking and unlocking
features, to limit access only to authorized medical personnel, and
incorporate software features giving them the capability of
maintaining an audit trail of access.
OBJECTS AND SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION
[0005] Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to
provide medical supply cabinet that is conveniently made of steel,
with steel shelves creating individual compartments within the
cabinet, and with a feature employing an RFID transducer for
recording inventory of items in the cabinet, but which avoids the
drawbacks of the prior art, and improves upon inventory count
accuracy.
[0006] It is another object to provide a medical supply cabinet or
cart that moves the incorporated RFID antenna array to each
respective space or compartment within the cabinet to conduct a
count or inventory of the inventory items contained within the
respective compartment. The cabinet may also incorporate one or
more pull-out drawers, and in that case the RFID
transducer/antennas are adapted to read the RFID tags of items
within each respective drawer. Of course, as used in this
description and claims, the terms "shelf", "compartment" and
"drawer" should be read broadly to cover any equivalent compartment
in which inventory items may be contained or stored.
[0007] In accordance with an aspect of the present invention, a
steel storage cabinet is formed having a frame, side walls, a top,
a base, a back, and several horizontal shelves arranged one above
another in said cabinet. These shelves define between them
respective storage compartments. For each compartment there may be
an access door at the front of the cabinet. The RFID-tagged items
may be stored in an orderly fashion in the various compartments. In
this case, the side walls, top, base, back, shelves and doors are
formed of steel. As mentioned earlier, the steel or metal can
interfere with reading RFID tags, and is relatively opaque to the
RF waves used in RFID techniques. In addition, the configuration of
the shelves and metal cabinet doors, sides, and back acts as a
Faraday cage and makes the contained tags difficult to
interrogate.
[0008] An RFID inventory interrogation and data collection
arrangement within cabinet, incorporates one or more RFID
transducer or reader, with attached antenna(s) or antenna array(s)
that are capable of emitting an RFID interrogate signal and are
also capable of receiving from the RFID-tagged items RFID response
signals. A vertical elevator is disposed within the cabinet to the
rear of the shelves, and the RFID antenna array is mounted on this
elevator so it can be positioned properly to take inventory of each
given compartment, one at a time. A drive arrangement controllably
drives the elevator up and down to position the RFID antenna array
so that it is properly aligned with a selected one of the
compartments. A computer control or similar equipment associated
with the cabinet controls the RFID transducer to cause same to
interrogate the RFID-tagged items within the selected compartment
and then to interpret the RFID responses received from the
RFID-tagged items. This may be implemented as a suitably programmed
computer connected by a wire or wireless connection to the RFID
transceiver and to the drive arrangement. In practice, the RFID
reader or transducer is fixedly mounted in the cabinet, and is
connected by cables to the antenna array, which may be one or
several antennas mounted on the vertical elevator or slide.
[0009] When the cabinet includes drawers, each of the drawers may
have a rear wall at its distal end (i.e., the end facing or
positioned adjacent the back wall of the cabinet when the drawer is
pushed closed) that is at least partly formed of a radiolucent
material (e.g., a sturdy plastic resin such as Lexan or Plexiglas)
that permits the RFID interrogate and response signals to
penetrate.
[0010] The vertical elevator can be implemented, e.g., as a
vertical slide at the back of the cabinet, or as an indexed belt
oriented vertically at the rear of the cabinet, or as a vertical
screw drive. In each case, the RFID reader/transducer is affixed
within the cabinet and the antenna array is mounted on the slide,
or belt, or screw drive so it can be moved up and down through its
various positions. The drive arrangement can be implemented as a
drive motor which may for example be a servomotor, a DC gearmotor,
an AC gearmotor, or a stepper motor. The antenna array may be one
or more antennas, e.g., circuit boards, mounted side to side to
match the width of the cabinet shelves. Alternatively, the
reader/transducer could also be mounted on the vertical slide or
belt, but this is not currently preferred.
[0011] The back of the cabinet may incorporate a long vertical
window, e.g. a sheet of Lexan, or a number of individual windows
for each respective compartment, with the window being formed of a
radiolucent material that permits the RFID interrogate signals and
RFID response signals to penetrate. In order to avoid the problem
of dead spots or dead zones, the drive arrangement can move the
RFID antenna array through a number of positions at each selected
one of the compartments. This may be done at discrete steps, or the
arrangement may sweep the RFID antenna array through several
positions.
[0012] The associated computer can be programmed to conduct an
inventory each time that the cabinet is accessed, to ascertain what
items have been removed, and thus create an access inventory
history or audit trail.
[0013] The above and many other objects, features, and advantages
of this invention will become apparent from the ensuing description
of a selected preferred embodiment, which is to be considered in
connection with the accompanying Drawing.
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWING
[0014] FIG. 1 is a front elevational view of a medical supply
cabinet of steel construction that constitutes one possible
embodiment of the present invention.
[0015] FIG. 2 is a sectional side elevation view, taken at the cut
line 2-2 in FIG. 1.
[0016] FIG. 3 is downward sectional view taken at cut line 3-3 of
FIG. 1.
[0017] FIG. 4 is a downward sectional view of a drawer taken at cut
line 4-4 of FIG. 1.
[0018] FIG. 5 is a schematic view of this embodiment.
DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT
[0019] With reference to the Drawing, FIGS. 1 to 4 illustrate a
steel medications cabinet or medical supply cabinet 10, formed of a
top 12, base 14, back 16, left and right side walls 18L and 18R,
and a number of internal shelves 20 (see cross section (FIG. 2) and
also FIG. 5). These components are all of steel construction, and a
steel frame of the cabinet holds all the components in place. The
cabinet 10 may be a floor-standing model, or may be in the form of
a cart 10 with wheels, rollers or casters, so as to be able to be
rolled easily into a room or nursing station. The shelves 20
together with sides 18L, 18R, and top 12 define respective internal
compartments 22, and there may be a number of pull-out drawers 24
as well; in this illustrative embodiment there is a stack of four
drawers 24. The compartments 22 each have a door 26 hinged at one
side, and a pull handle, and may have an electrically controlled
latch that can be remotely or locally unlocked for access to the
respective compartment. The drawers 24 each have a front panel 28
which may include a lock or latch.
[0020] At one side of the cabinet 10 there is a computer shelf 30
supporting a computer or PC 32, including a monitor 34, mouse 36
and keyboard. 38. An authorized user may employ the computer 32 to
unlock and access a given one of the compartments or drawers to
obtain the inventory items(s) contained therein.
[0021] As shown better in FIGS. 2, 3, and 5, an RFID antenna array
40 is disposed at the rear of the cabinet and is mounted on a
vertical transport or elevator 42. The associated RFID transceiver
41 is mounted at a fixed location within the cabinet, and is
connected by cables to the antenna array 40. The transceiver also
has connections to receive power and network connection. In this
illustrative embodiment the elevator 42 is an indexed belt drive,
but in other possible embodiments the elevator may take the form of
a screw drive or a slide mechanism adapted to raise and lower the
RFID antenna array 40 along the height of the cabinet so that it
traverses each of the compartments 22, and also traverses the
vertical spaces occupied by the respective drawers 24. At the base
14 of the cabinet is a drive motor 44 for the vertical elevator 42,
which may be an AC gearmotor, a DC gearmotor, a stepper motor, or a
servo motor. An index reader or counter 46, which may consist of a
potentiometer or an encoder, is positioned adjacent the belt of the
elevator 42 to provide position information to the computer 32. The
array 40 is formed of a series of antennas, each in the form of a
rectangular circuit board, with the array occupying the width of
the interior of the cabinet.
[0022] Each of the shelves 20 in the compartments 22 and each of
the drawers 24 contains hospital supply or medical items and
materials that will be needed or may be needed by an attending care
giver in the course of hospital care. As a practical matter, each
of the inventory items has a respective RFID tag, encoded with
identifying data corresponding to the associated inventory
item.
[0023] The power cord for connecting with the hospital AC power is
not shown here.
[0024] A rear portion of the cabinet 10, disposed vertically behind
the shelves 20 and drawers 24, is at least partly constructed of a
radiolucent material 50, e.g., a plastic resin. This material
allows the RFID signals to pass through without undue attenuation
or scattering. This may be, as shown here, a long sheet of plastic
material aligned with the vertical path of the RFID antenna array,
or may be comprised of a number of discrete window elements
arranged vertically so that the RFID antenna array 40 can be
situated at more than one elevated position for each of the
compartments. The radiolucent sheet 50 also serves to keep the
cabinet contents isolated from the moving antenna array.
[0025] In this embodiment each drawer 24, as shown in FIG. 4, has
several rows of compartments or bins 54, and can be of the same
general configuration of the medications drawer disclosed in my
earlier-filed U.S. patent application Ser. No. 13/291,462, filed
Nov. 8, 2011, the contents of which are incorporated by reference
herein.
[0026] The compartments 54 may, in some embodiments, have locking
lids to limit access to the contents.
[0027] As shown here, the back or distal wall 56 of the drawer has
a portion (or portions) 58 formed of a radiolucent material to
allow the RFID energy to pass between the RFID antenna array 40 and
the interiors of the compartments 54 in the drawer. These portions
58 may be windows formed in the back wall 56, where the latter is
of steel construction, or may be a single vertical strip or sheet,
or may constitute the entire construction of the back wall.
Depending on the construction of the drawers, the radiolucent
portion 58 may not be necessary, as a sufficient amount of the RF
energy may pass between the antennas of the transducer or reader
and the interior of the drawer.
[0028] The computer 32 is suitably programmed to control the drive
motor 44 so as to position the RFID antenna array 40 at the
vertical position(s) required to interrogate the contents of each
of the spaces, i.e., the contents of each of the compartments 24
and drawers 22 in turn. The vertical elevator 42 can carry out
small movements up and down at the rear of each space, so that the
transducer 40 can scan around any dead zones or RF dead spots, and
ensure a capture of all RFID tags in the respective space.
[0029] The computer 32 stores inventory information of all the
RFID-tagged inventory items contained in the cabinet 10. The
computer may also be suitably programmed to keep an inventory audit
trail or accounting, based on successive scans, of which inventory
items have been removed, and when, and which have been added to the
inventory.
[0030] This arrangement enables the system to have database control
over the exact locations of the medications and supplies. RFID
coding of the medications or other contents of the cabinet permits
the access to those materials to be recorded and tracked. Access
controls associated with the cabinet computer 32 can also identify
the person accessing the items, and the time of access. Similarly,
methods employing RFID identification of individual medications can
also be used for security and prevention of medication dispensing
errors.
[0031] The individual cabinets configured for RFID inventory, as
described here, may also be joined together using a daisy-chain i2C
communications protocol, for tracking inventory of an array of
cabinets.
[0032] The RFID reader backs of the cabinets can be made as a
bolt-on option to be attached onto a standard (non-RFID) cabinet.
This allows the cabinets to be constructed the same both with and
without the RFID inventory feature, with the cabinet back,
radiolucent window, RFID reader, RFID antenna array, and vertical
elevator all constructed as a unit and bolted in place onto the
cabinet when an RFID-capable cabinet is ordered, or if it is
desired to convert a standard steel cabinet to a cabinet with the
RFID automated inventory feature.
[0033] While the invention has been described hereinabove with
reference to selected preferred embodiments, it should be
recognized that the invention is not limited to those precise
embodiments. Rather, many modification and variations would present
themselves to persons skilled in the art without departing from the
scope and spirit of this invention, as defined in the appended
claims.
* * * * *