Doctors and health workers have to go through all the major battle amid the coronavirus pandemic. It’s definitely an exhausting time for them to cover themselves with layers of PEP kit and then ensure social distancing. To protect all the health workers from COVID-19 infection, the East Coast Railways Central Hospital in Odisha is using a Medical Robot called MeD ROBO to provide medicines, food and remote assistance to patients in the coronavirus ward, without any need for physical contact.
The MeD ROBO is operated through a unique mobile app that has been developed as part of the innovation, supported by the WiFi facility, an ECoR official said. The robot is helping that hospital staff to serve food and medicines to COVID-19 patients while avoiding the physical contact. The robot’s sensor can be read a patient’s body temperature and transmit the same for display on the smartphone. In case of any abnormal high-temperature reading, the MeD ROBO is capable of raising an alarm so as to alert the hospital staff attending to the patients.
This is an in-house innovation by East Coast Railway. Diesel Loco Shed at Visakhapatnam has fabricated this robot to assist hospital staff to serve COVID patients. Before being deployed for use in Central Railway Hospital at Mancheswar, the MeD ROBO underwent extensive trials and demonstrations, he said. In a similar development, a robot at a hospital in the Mexican capital is providing a lifeline for coronavirus patients separated from their relatives and reducing the risk of infection for medical workers.
“Hi, I’m LaLuchy Robotina! What’s your name?” the 1.4-meter-tall (4.6 feet) robot asks patients as it goes from room to room. It moves all around on the wheels and has a camera and display screen enabling relatives and doctors to chat with patients or staff in full protective gear in the coronavirus ward. “It would allows us to have a physical presence… but with zero exposure to aerosols within the Covid-19 area,” said Lucia Ledesma, a neuropsychologist at the November 20 National Medical Center.
