A Hand Hygiene Tracking System With LoRaWAN Network for the Abolition of Hospital-Acquired Infections
K M Abubeker, S. Baskar
Abstract
In healthcare settings, hand hygiene is a crucial step in preventing the spread of disease. Healthcare-associated infections, such as community-acquired pneumonia (CAP) and hospital-acquired pneumonia (HAP), can be mitigated with the help of cutting-edge solutions and intelligent alcohol-based hand sanitizers. Specifically, this research presents a long-range (LoRa) network powered by the Internet of Things (IoT) that can detect, monitor and track hand hygiene habits to reduce the spread of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs). The wearable Bluetooth low energy (BLE) device used by hospital personnel and patients will monitor and track the hygiene activities using LoRa and alcohol-based sanitizers deployed in intensive care units (ICUs), elevators, inpatient rooms, and other hospital facilities. The alcohol dispenser is equipped with a Jetson Nano graphics processing unit (GPU) from NVIDIA, a hand sanitizer, and a door that opens once the user has washed their hands. Using a LoRa wide area network (LoRaWAN) and short-range BLE technology, hand hygiene information, with a user ID and GPS location, has it sent to a LoRa gateway and a cloud server. Various field tests in hospital settings and simulated environments are performed to effectively guarantee the clinical performance of the proposed IoT-enabled LoRa network. In conclusion, the total success percentage in real-world LoRa network conditions is 92.78%, whereas the success rate (SR) in laboratory testing is 98%.