Installation Highlights:

	155 bed facility (expandable to 258) encompassing over one million square feet
	Facility-wide asset tracking with 2300 sensed zones and 3500 tagged medically sensitive items
	Mass casualty center
	Medical educational and training facility for all branches of the military
	One of the busiest military medical centers in the U.S.

Womack tracks over 3500 pieces of medical equipment using Versus active RFID-IR tags

Womack Army Medical Center Fort Bragg, North Carolina

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Discover Why Womack Army Medical Center Expanded a Versus Information System Installed in 1999 Throughout the Entire Facility.

One of the Busiest Military Medical Centers in the U.S.
Womack Army Medical Center is located at Fort Bragg, one of the largest U.S. Army installations in the world by population. Womack is an educational and training medical center for medical department personnel from all branches of the military, both active duty and reserves. In addition to being a key mass casualty center, Womack’s hospital and clinics offer care to approximately 170,000 active duty and retired service members and their families.

Versus Advantages - A Locating System Worth Expanding
The Versus system was installed on the cardiac floors in November of 1999 to track telemetry patients. Because it was accurate, reasonable in cost, and could support a wide variety of applications, the value of locating on a larger scale became apparent to senior administration. When planning an asset tracking system for a 2002 expansion, Womack contacted Versus as well as other companies offering different locating technologies that had emerged since the original install. According to Dale Nuxoll, Logistics Analyst Supervisor, “We needed to be able to find and locate equipment for medical maintenance, to save money on bio-med expenses.”

Flexibility is Important The flexibility of VIS led to the decision to continue and upgrade with Versus on a facility-wide scale, and that system has been in use since February 2002. According to Womack, “The reason we stayed with Versus is they worked with us. There were several additional companies we contacted. The folks at Versus were willing to work with us to make this system do what we wanted it to do per our special requests. Some of the other companies didn’t want to. It was their product, their way and that’s it.” He continued, “The most important thing is flexibility.” Anything That Requires a Scheduled Service Finding equipment in a facility with over one million square feet is no small task. With 2300 sensed zones and 3500 tagged items, Womack is perhaps the largest installation utilizing active RFID-IR locating in the world. What types of equipment do Womack’s Bio-medical and Property Departments track? “Everything” that is, “anything that requires a scheduled service, bio-med maintenance, accountable equipment, MASCAL carts, pharmacy carts, crash carts, and personnel.”

Womack uses asset tags to track wheel chairs, as shown above by LTC Chapa.

Better Location Data
Unlike Versus, some locating systems provide only general location information, such as what particular zone of a facility an item is in. “What we want is the specific room and not just a general area. Our staff’s time is valuable, we don’t want our staff wasting time looking for something.” Versus real-time locating combines radio frequency identification with infrared signals, to provide highly accurate, room or bed level locations and status information.

Increased Efficiency in the Bio-med Department
The benefits of being able to identify equipment locations in real-time are evident. “Bio-med (Medical Maintenance) efficiency jumped to 98 - 99 percent in performance of scheduled services, because you can find the products. That in turn saves money. Before we had to survey it, the item, and that takes time. You’re talking multiple man hours of lost productivity, department-wide and on a regular basis.”

Increased Patient Safety
Finding assets in case of product recalls is also critical. “Two years ago a particular pump was recalled due to a bad gasket and required replacement. We had to get them away from the patients immediately. We were able to run the Versus program and go straight to the rooms. So within an hour we had all of the recalled equipment downstairs and away from the patients where we could repair them; that’s what’s important.” And increased patient safety is essential to risk management. “We had zero product liability due to equipment malfunction. You cannot equate that into a per hour savings when we use this operation. You can say we had no negatives.”

Quality Improvement
Custom configurable software provides a user-friendly interface to access data collected by the hardware network. Reports Plus is a SQL-based reporting package that allows system users to view important information related to the location, movement, interaction, and utilization of valuable equipment. Reports Plus accumulates historical equipment location data to identify equipment flow patterns, and generates utilization reports that are helpful in assessing QI efforts.

Emergency Preparedness Womack is a designated mass casualty center, the facility must be able to respond rapidly and effectively to sudden surges caused by either natural disasters or terrorist attacks. Versus Advantages provides real-time decision support as well as historical data for process analysis, allowing the hospital to view time-motion data dynamically. Improved analysis leads to better process flow in mass casualty exercises, which in turn better prepares the staff and facility for real life mass traumas. Tracking Product Expiration Dates WAMC effectively tracks the lot numbers and expiration date of products on its MASCAL, pharmacy, and crash carts by associating the Versus asset tag to the cart’s contents. When needed, expired or recalled products are quickly located with a click of a button.

ROI: Reduced Expenses “We’ve had zero product liabilities with equipment, we have had zero loss of tagged assets since implementing the program. The items that were tagged were recovered. The fact is, since the acquisition of additional assets, and with the new tags, the cost of operation is close to zero.” Dale Nuxoll Logistics Analyst Supervisor Womack Army Medical Center

Return on Investment
Versus Advantages has improved utilization of equipment and promoted a leaner, more efficient operation at Womack by making inventory available.

“...if you have fifty pieces of equipment and you use thirty, and someone wants to spend money to buy more, why don’t you just find the other twenty? There’s no direct way to assess a dollar amount; we know it’s a significant savings.”

According to Womack, product liability, risk management, accountability, patient safety, and resource allocation efforts have all been enhanced at Womack Army Medical Center since the implementation of Versus Advantages.

Reports Plus is an essential tool for gathering and analyzing data which can be used for time management studies, research inquiries, and historical documentation.

 

About Womack Womack Army Medical Center is located in Fort Bragg, North Carolina home of the Airborne and Special Operations Command. The installation is also home to the following units: XVIII Airborne Corps, 82nd Airborne Division, United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC), and Theater Sustainment Command. For more information on the installation at Womack Army Medical Center, contact LTC Daniel Chapa, Director of Logistics or Dale Nuxoll, Logistics Analyst Supervisor at Womack Army Medical Center, Fort Bragg, North Carolina by e-mail at: daniel.chapa@amedd.army.mil or dale.nuxoll@amedd.army.mil. www.wamc.amedd.army.mil