Touch-Technologie MicroTouch ClearTek II
Medical centres have never been busier, which is why more and more are installing touch screens that allow patients to check themselves in, then alert them when the doctor is ready. Audio-visual solution provider Innovations in Technology chose capacitive touch screen technology from 3M Touch Systems to deliver the robustness, reliability and picture quality that these applications demand.
Coping with queues
Time is precious for doctors in medical health centres. In the UK, a typical consultation is scheduled to take just ten minutes, so waiting rooms serving a typical five doctors will see 30 patients every hour. Time is precious; not least for the receptionist, who also has to make appointments and deal with enquiries over the phone, amongst a host of other administrative duties. Often, patients can queue for several minutes just to let the doctor know they have arrived.
What is more, doctors may have several hundred patients on their books – perhaps thousands in inner-city practices. It is unlikely the doctor or receptionist will know the patient personally. Yet they rely on accurate identity information to ensure the right records go with the patient to the consultation. Identifying someone unambiguously requires three separate items of personal information - usually date of birth, address, and first and last name.
Many people are nervous about giving this information out in front a queue of strangers. Couple that with the communication difficulties involved with catchments that include many ethnic groups, and there is added potential for identity confusion. An increasingly popular solution is to provide patients with a self check-in facility via touch screens in the waiting room.
A complete self check-in solution
Based in Leeds in the North of England, Innovations in Technology Ltd offers surgeries a complete package for check-in, from initial enquiry to installation. It links to software such as Systm One – one of the most widely deployed patient records systems throughout the UK National Health Service. The software's inbuilt patient check-in module is deployed straight into the touch screen monitor.
As they arrive in the surgery, patients answer a series of simple questions to verify their identity. They are then assigned a colour code corresponding to the doctor with whom the appointment has been made. When the doctor is ready to see the patient, the screen flashes that colour, alerting the patient to make their way to the doctor's consultation room. This process eliminates the privacy issues of public address announcements, as well as overcoming language barriers.
The application is a demanding one for the monitor. Screens get a great deal of wear, and have to display a bright, clear image that is easy to read, even by visually impaired patients. Innovations in Technology has adopted as standard MicroTouch ClearTek II Capacitive Touch Screen technology from 3M Touch Systems to provide the best combination of benefits.
The capacitive touch screen advantage
Although there are many ways to sense touch, capacitive touch screen technologies such as ClearTek II, are the most popular choice today, offering fast and accurate touch performance, physical durability, excellent light transmission, advanced anti-glare properties and high reliability. Explains Francesco Fasoglio, European Marketing Manager, 3M Touch Systems division: “Unlike resistive overlays, where a flexible top layer makes contact with a rigid bottom layer when pressed, capacitive touch technologies are genuinely free of moving parts, making them inherently more reliable.
Moreover, where resistive touch sensing requires two electrically conductive coatings, capacitive overlays make do with one layer or a very thin conductive coating, allowing more light to pass through – hence a brighter, clearer picture.” ClearTek II capacitive touch screens feature an additional hard coating to protect them from wear and tear caused by contaminants, abrasion and continuous touches to the same spot on the screen. This coating allows at least five times more resistance to wear than other capacitive sensor solutions. Equally important, it can cope with aggressive cleaning including anti-bacterial agents.
As well as the touch technology used, the properties of the glass layers also affect the overall user experience. ClearTek II capacitive touch screens offer higher levels of light transmission than any other solution in the market place today. Anti-glare coatings reduce reflections that impair image quality, and an optional special light control film is available from 3M enabling Innovations in Technology to offer medical centres a further level of privacy. The film provides increased confidentiality to end-users by reducing the viewing angle to 60 degrees. It all adds up to a better user experience, evidenced by the quick user acceptance of these user-friendly terminals.
Monitor design benefits
“Visual performance and dependability are the most important factors”, explained David Wellens, Finance Director of Innovations in Technology. “Other design features also weighed in favour of the 3M touch screens. The MicroTouch M150 15-inch desktop monitor models offer a large enough display area for this type of application, but are nevertheless compact with a small footprint.” Further, Wellens emphasised the virtues of flexible installation: “We needed a screen that could be installed on the receptionist's counter or alternatively mounted on the waiting-room wall. The 3M monitors comply with VESA mounting standards, so it gives us compatibility with a wide variety of brackets and mounting kits. We can easily mount them at the right height for wheelchair access, for example.
The result is fast, hassle-free installation” concluded Wellens. The icing on the cake, for installers and end-users alike, is 3M Touch Systems’ Touch Assured warranty. This offers a service that guarantees a replacement monitor will be delivered within forty-eight hours, to any European country.
Positive prognosis
To date, around 30 patient check-in systems fitted with the 3M touch-screen monitor have been installed in UK surgeries from West Yorkshire to Nottingham and Bedfordshire. With performance, reliability and service to match, this is really just the start.
Time is precious for doctors in medical health centres. In the UK, a typical consultation is scheduled to take just ten minutes, so waiting rooms serving a typical five doctors will see 30 patients every hour. Time is precious; not least for the receptionist, who also has to make appointments and deal with enquiries over the phone, amongst a host of other administrative duties. Often, patients can queue for several minutes just to let the doctor know they have arrived.
What is more, doctors may have several hundred patients on their books – perhaps thousands in inner-city practices. It is unlikely the doctor or receptionist will know the patient personally. Yet they rely on accurate identity information to ensure the right records go with the patient to the consultation. Identifying someone unambiguously requires three separate items of personal information - usually date of birth, address, and first and last name.
Many people are nervous about giving this information out in front a queue of strangers. Couple that with the communication difficulties involved with catchments that include many ethnic groups, and there is added potential for identity confusion. An increasingly popular solution is to provide patients with a self check-in facility via touch screens in the waiting room.
A complete self check-in solution
Based in Leeds in the North of England, Innovations in Technology Ltd offers surgeries a complete package for check-in, from initial enquiry to installation. It links to software such as Systm One – one of the most widely deployed patient records systems throughout the UK National Health Service. The software's inbuilt patient check-in module is deployed straight into the touch screen monitor.
As they arrive in the surgery, patients answer a series of simple questions to verify their identity. They are then assigned a colour code corresponding to the doctor with whom the appointment has been made. When the doctor is ready to see the patient, the screen flashes that colour, alerting the patient to make their way to the doctor's consultation room. This process eliminates the privacy issues of public address announcements, as well as overcoming language barriers.
The application is a demanding one for the monitor. Screens get a great deal of wear, and have to display a bright, clear image that is easy to read, even by visually impaired patients. Innovations in Technology has adopted as standard MicroTouch ClearTek II Capacitive Touch Screen technology from 3M Touch Systems to provide the best combination of benefits.
The capacitive touch screen advantage
Although there are many ways to sense touch, capacitive touch screen technologies such as ClearTek II, are the most popular choice today, offering fast and accurate touch performance, physical durability, excellent light transmission, advanced anti-glare properties and high reliability. Explains Francesco Fasoglio, European Marketing Manager, 3M Touch Systems division: “Unlike resistive overlays, where a flexible top layer makes contact with a rigid bottom layer when pressed, capacitive touch technologies are genuinely free of moving parts, making them inherently more reliable.
Moreover, where resistive touch sensing requires two electrically conductive coatings, capacitive overlays make do with one layer or a very thin conductive coating, allowing more light to pass through – hence a brighter, clearer picture.” ClearTek II capacitive touch screens feature an additional hard coating to protect them from wear and tear caused by contaminants, abrasion and continuous touches to the same spot on the screen. This coating allows at least five times more resistance to wear than other capacitive sensor solutions. Equally important, it can cope with aggressive cleaning including anti-bacterial agents.
As well as the touch technology used, the properties of the glass layers also affect the overall user experience. ClearTek II capacitive touch screens offer higher levels of light transmission than any other solution in the market place today. Anti-glare coatings reduce reflections that impair image quality, and an optional special light control film is available from 3M enabling Innovations in Technology to offer medical centres a further level of privacy. The film provides increased confidentiality to end-users by reducing the viewing angle to 60 degrees. It all adds up to a better user experience, evidenced by the quick user acceptance of these user-friendly terminals.
Monitor design benefits
“Visual performance and dependability are the most important factors”, explained David Wellens, Finance Director of Innovations in Technology. “Other design features also weighed in favour of the 3M touch screens. The MicroTouch M150 15-inch desktop monitor models offer a large enough display area for this type of application, but are nevertheless compact with a small footprint.” Further, Wellens emphasised the virtues of flexible installation: “We needed a screen that could be installed on the receptionist's counter or alternatively mounted on the waiting-room wall. The 3M monitors comply with VESA mounting standards, so it gives us compatibility with a wide variety of brackets and mounting kits. We can easily mount them at the right height for wheelchair access, for example.
The result is fast, hassle-free installation” concluded Wellens. The icing on the cake, for installers and end-users alike, is 3M Touch Systems’ Touch Assured warranty. This offers a service that guarantees a replacement monitor will be delivered within forty-eight hours, to any European country.
Positive prognosis
To date, around 30 patient check-in systems fitted with the 3M touch-screen monitor have been installed in UK surgeries from West Yorkshire to Nottingham and Bedfordshire. With performance, reliability and service to match, this is really just the start.
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