Hospitals can deliver higher quality care, make better use of their facilities (such as operating rooms) and keep track of valuable equipment -- all through RFID.

Journalist Elizabeth Roop has written an excellent review of the state of RFID in hospitals. It turns out that hospitals are adopting RFID in increasing frequency and -- lo and behold -- they are getting real results.

Two key insights jumped out at me from the report.

First, hospitals seem to be a kind of orchestra production, requiring lots of people and stuff to come together all at the right time. Therefore, a key motivation for using RFID in hospitals is real-time location tracking, as this quote from the article notes:

"Given the inherently mobile nature of healthcare, RFID offers potential benefits that can impact quality of care, outcomes, and healthcare delivery costs. Many activities that occur in healthcare require the coming together of a very specific group of workers and assets in order to run a diagnostic test or deliver therapy" such as cardiac catherization, interventional radiology, and gastroenterology studies, says Tim Gee, principal, Medical Connectivity Consulting. "Complex logistics are required to pull these events together, deliver safe and efficacious care, capture charges, and document everything. So tracking equipment, personnel, and patients throughout the care delivery process can greatly impact both clinical and financial outcomes."

Second, because a key function of RFID in hospitals is real-time location tracking, it appears that active RFID is a more practicable solution today in many situations, than passive RFID:

"Active RFID for location-based services for tracking mobile assets, patients, and staff is an incredible value proposition today," says Gregg Malkary, managing director, Spyglass Consulting Group. "With passive RFID, many of these applications are anywhere from three to seven years out, depending upon the application."

Read about RFID in healthcare and hospitals.

Hat tip to Tim Gee of the Medical Connectivity blog, who is quoted in the report, too.