Prefense™ Early Detection and Notification System™

Remote continuous monitoring of patients on the general floor is all the rage these days. At the ongoing meeting of the American Society of Anesthesiologists (ASA) we checked out quite a few such monitoring systems. Here’s some new technology from Nihon Kohden America, a subsidiary of Nihon Kohden Corporation, Japan. Based on the company’s recently introduced NTX transmitter, a device that is capable of monitoring EKG, SpO2, respiration and cuff blood pressure even in ambulating patients, the system was designed “to protect hospital patients from medical harm and enhance the efficiency of rapid response teams,” the company says.
More about the transmitter and the system:

The NTX transmitter operates in the new protected WMTS frequency band and provides economical operation through the use of 3 alkaline “AA” batteries.
NTX is designed to provide hospitals with more flexible monitoring on higher acuity patients. As hospitals struggle to reduce costs and operate more efficiently, a trend has emerged where hospitals are monitoring higher acuity ambulatory patients on telemetry and medical-surgical floors. In the past, this trend has been limited to only ECG or ECG and Sp02 monitoring. Any patient requiring non-invasive blood pressure monitoring has been confined to a hard-wired bedside monitor, limiting their mobility. With Nihon Kohden’s NTX transmitter hospitals can now safely and effectively monitor higher acuity patients outside of traditional critical care units…
As the 5 Million Lives Campaign has demonstrated, every patient in the hospital qualifies as a high risk patient, not just those in conventionally monitored areas such as critical care or telemetry. Yet traditionally, and primarily due to cost and staffing issues, continuous monitoring and observation takes place only in monitoring units. That creates significant risk exposure among the large number of patients in Med/Surg wards, where many of the 15 million instances of medical harm occur each year.
Nihon Kohden America believes that many of these events could be prevented with the Prefense™ system. It consists of a new, low acuity central station interface that is simple, easy to use and cost-effective, combined with the company’s NTX wireless telemetry transmitters. Prefense™ is the only solution that seamlessly integrates the mobility of Nihon Kohden America’s NTX, the advance warning capabilities of continuous trend analysis and the proven effectiveness of Rapid Response Teams.

Press release: Nihon Kohden America, Inc. Introduces Prefense Early Detection and Notification System …
NTX technology page…
Nihon Kohden America …