New challenges in controlling EMI in hospitals

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Abstract

Over the last twenty years, hospitals have been attempting to incorporate wireless technology into their day-to-day operations. Clinical engineers who are responsible to facilitate the integration of wireless technology into hospitals are faced with many challenges. Wireless technology has been evolving from networks with a small number of relatively high power sources to networks with a large number of relatively low power sources. This has made characterizing the hospital electromagnetic environment a complicated process and the associated potential for electromagnetic interference (EMI) difficult to determine. There is no globally-accepted comprehensive protocol to evaluate the function/malfunction of medical devices exposed to radio-frequency (RF) fields. In addition, there is often uncertainty in determining the degree of clinical impact that a malfunction has. The evaluation of malfunctions and their severity is not only a technical matter related to expected behavior of the medical devices, but must be evaluated considering: the clinical status of the patient, the medical staff opinion, institutional mission and the intended application of the device. There is a need for the development of RF management policies to deal with the changing reality of wireless in hospitals and to develop more effective clinical impact of EMI testing. Risk mitigation policy is a part of the evidence-based management programs. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2007.

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Muhlen, S. S., Davis, D., Segal, B., & Vazquez, G. (2008). New challenges in controlling EMI in hospitals. In IFMBE Proceedings (Vol. 18, pp. 834–837). Springer Verlag. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-74471-9_193

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