Submitted my article for publication…www.aami.org. Here is the abstract
Validation and Verification of WLAN Medical Devices in the Healthcare Enterprise ©
v1.1 31 May 2012 – David H. Hoglund – Integra Systems, Inc. www.integrasystems.org
The quantification and qualification of the quality of service requirements for wireless medical devices as well as the provider WLAN market has been inconsistent. Until recently, there has been no valid ways of testing and validation of the quality of service requirements for WLAN enabled medical devices that will be deployed on a shared enterprise wireless network. This article will describe the test tools, validation and verification test protocols, and deployment methodologies that will ensure the safe and reliable design of WLAN enabled medical devices; but also their deployment in the provider space.
This article somewhat parallels the author’s article from IT Horizons 2008 “Wireless Broadband Management for the Integrated Healthcare Network; but it reflects current in 2012.
What are the overall drivers of change in 2012?
Virtually all medical device manufactures have embedded some 802.11 connectivity (802.11g/a) within their client devices. The “smart pump initiative” drove this in the past, but today it is all about getting that information in the EMR. However, not all embedded 802.11 client radios are the same, or is the protocol stack the same, let alone how the actual antenna element is designed into the medical device. Medical device companies have tended to think that a WLAN adapter for a medical device is just like a WLAN enabled laptop and thus they can use the same typical deployment model. However, this is not case as the majority of WLAN enabled medical devices do not have the same use model as a typical enterprise WLAN enabled laptop or wireless voice over IP phone. Taking this into account many medical device companies that do deploy their WLAN enabled medical devices in a shared wired/wireless enterprise environment may not take into account the correct or right
site design.
