Abstract Simulations are beneficial in evaluating clinicians’ empirical competencies through practical skills, prioritizing, and decision-making as part of patient care scenarios generally run a full-scale physical context. However, such simulations require space, manufacturing, replacement damaged or used equipment. On the other hand, virtual reality (VR) computerized simulators comparatively ...

This paper analyses life cycle cost for equipment protected by both base and extended warranty policies from a consumer’s perspective. We assume that the equipment have two types of failures: minor and catastrophic. A minor failure can be corrected by a minimal repair whereas a catastrophic failure can only be removed by a replacement. The equipment is assumed to be maintained at no charge to t...

A 77-year-old man became asystolic 3 days after aortic valve replacement and coronary artery bypass surgery. A dual-chamber temporary pacemaker generator was turned on but failed to discharge; instead, an obscure error message appeared on the liquid crystal display of the pacemaker. The intensive-care nurses and physicians were unable to activate the pacemaker. We describe the pacemaker design ...

Objectives: Phlebotomy and venous cannulation are common, technically challenging and potentially distressing procedures in pediatrics. The aim of this pilot study was to assess whether a novel medical equipment holder could be a useful adjunct for venipuncture in children. Methods: Doctors and nurses at a district general hospital were asked to analyze the portable medical equipment holder and...

BACKGROUND We tested melodic auditory alarms recommended in the IEC 60601-1-8 standard for medical electrical equipment for ease of learning and discrimination, and for effectiveness during a timeshared task. METHODS Twenty-two critical care nurses learned the IEC 60601-1-8 melodic alarms over two training sessions more than a week apart, with or without mnemonics suggested in the standard. S...

Clinical engineering departments in hospitals are responsible for establishing and regulating a Medical Equipment Management Program to ensure that medical devices are safe and reliable. In order to mitigate functional failures, significant and critical devices should be identified and prioritized. In this paper, we present a multi-criteria decision-making model to prioritize medical devices ac...

This paper reports the first of several tests of new auditory alarms originally proposed by Block et al. [1] and formalized in IEC 60601-1-8 for use in medical electrical equipment. We test whether participants who are supplied with the IEC-recommended mnemonics while learning label-alarm associations can more accurately identify the alarms after short periods of learning. Results for 18 partic...