Tageos, a provider of RFID solutions for item-level tagging, announced that the Bassin de Thau Hospital in southern France is live with an RFID-based medical record management system.

The City of Sete hospital leverages Tageos’ EOS-500 ready-to-use passive ultra-high frequency (UHF) RFID labels to streamline management of its 120,000 paper patient records. Over 40,000 paper patient records out of 120,000 are now tagged with a Tageos RFID label. Going forward, 15,000 additional patient records will be tagged each year.

Previously, bar codes were manually scanned as paper records exited the archive room, however they were rarely scanned again as they were being handed over from one department to another.

The RFID system offers time saving and productivity gains for the fifteen medical archive specialists who work at the hospital. An RFID portal at the entrance of the central archive room scans patient records as they enter or leave the room – automatically logging the transfer of patient records from one department to another. The archive team also uses handheld PDAs equipped with RFID antenna to locate lost medical records within the archive room, and elsewhere in the hospital.

While many hospitals are transitioning to all digital patient records, some government regulations mandate that hospitals keep existing paper patient records for upwards of thirty years depending on patients’ ages and medical conditions.

With a capacity of 823 beds and a staff of over 1,500 professionals, Bassin de Thau Hospital also envisions labeling medical supplies and bed linen as they move through the hospital. And if privacy concerns are addressed, the hospital even foresees equipping patients with RFID bracelets.