A Call for Safer Utilization of Radio Frequency Identification in the e-Health Era

Abstract

The main purpose of this study was to investigate the perceptions of the electromagnetic interference (EMI) caused by radio frequency identification (RFID) with medical devices among hospitals as well as to call the attention of medical institutions to the development of RFID applications. A survey sponsored by the Department of Health of Taiwan was conducted and the target subjects were every hospital in Taiwan (486 in total). The survey topics included testing of RFID interference with medical devices and perceptions of safety issues of RFID. The main targets of the survey were the Chief Information Officers (CIOs) or the main person responsible for RFID systems in each hospital. Of the original 486 questionnaires mailed, 273 were returned. A return rate of 56.17% was obtained. The survey results revealed that only six hospitals had carried out tests on interference by RFID with medical devices, and the results of these tests indicated that RFID does not interfere with medical devices. A majority of hospitals understood that RFID may interfere with medical devices but did not think that this would seriously harm patients. The application of RFID in the healthcare industry is certainly promising; however, EMI issues must be appropriately handled. This study asserts that most hospitals do not understand or pay insufficient attention to the issue of RFID interference with patient safety or medical devices. In addition, most hospitals believe that the problem of RFID should be resolved by RFID vendors. Therefore, this study argues that medical institutions should develop more understanding of RFID issues and that more attention should be given to the potential problems of RFID interference when developing RFID applications.

Application safety evaluation of the radio frequency identification tag under magnetic resonance imaging

“…Researchers at St. Gallen Canton Hospital in Switzerland reported that high-frequency 13.56 MHz RFID tags would not interfere with the functionality of imaging devices [15] significantly. However, there are reports stating that RFID technology is capable of inducing potentially hazardous incidents in medical devices, especially in implantable pacemakers, defibrillators and critical care equipments [5–8]. In this study, repetitive experiments were performed in three typical scan sequences with a phantom of standard size to investigate the effects of active RFID tags having on MR imaging quality.…”

“…However, although several studies have shown that RFID tags may cause side effects to some critical care medical equipments, such as infusion/syringe pumps and implantable pacemakers and so on [5–7], little attention has been paid to the EMI effects caused by RFID applications in hospitals in the last few years. Considering the RFID technology widely using in healthcare without exploring EMI, studies and evaluations on patient safety affected by EMI should be made urgently [8]. Hospitals should not ignore the possibility of EMI even though the number of incidents reports is low [9].…”

A mapping analytic approach to trace development of multidisciplinary research field

“…The implementation of e-health also needs technology delivery, which promotes evolution of computing science and information systems. In computing science, scholars appeal the era of safer utilization of radio frequency identification (Liu et al, 2011), the use of a lightweight middleware for an e-health WSN-based system using android technology (Boulmalf et al, 2012), wireless technologies (El Khaddar et al, 2012), cloud-based architecture for e-health wireless sensor networks (Lounis et al, 2012), digital rights management and side channel attacks defense mechanisms for security and privacy in e-health (Papalambrou et al, 2012). In information systems, e-health develops a lot either.…”

Radiofrequency identification and medical devices: the regulatory framework on electromagnetic compatibility. Part I: medical devices

“…Numerous applications are improving patient care by tracking medical devices, drugs, patients and so on [7][8][9][10][11][12]. However, albeit the advantages, there is one important potential risk: electromagnetic interference with medical devices [13][14][15][16][17][18], because RFID systems emit electromagnetic waves.…”