2008 InfoWorld CTO 25: Dave Dillehunt, FirstHealth of the Carolinas

Nurses at Moore Regional Hospital in Pinehurst, N.C., were squirreling away medical devices such as intravenous pumps in closets and cabinets so that they could reach them when their patients needed them. Because these devices couldn’t be located quickly by the entire staff, the hospital had to buy 30 percent more than it really needed to ensure there were plenty on hand.

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So Dillehunt tried another tack: deploying radiofrequency identification technology, or RFID, to track the medical devices wherever they happened to be.

But RFID presented yet another challenge: A thousand constantly pinging RFID tags might bog down Dillehunt’s prized wireless data network. “We’re very protective of that bandwidth resource,” he says. “I want to make sure our physicians never have an issue trying to get a connection.”

So he decided to outfit five Aethon robots (two were already being used to deliver medication) with antennas and RFID readers. As these oversized vacuum cleaners made their rounds dispensing medication, they could record a nearby device’s location, then download the data into an asset tracking system upon their return — thus, no need to tap into the wireless network.

One robot, nicknamed Homer the Roamer, spends all day roaming the hospital’s six floors, traveling some 840,000 feet. Homer is dedicated solely to picking up RFID tag signals. He has become a fan favorite among young patients. “Now moving around obstacle,” Homer blurts out to children’s delight.

Dillehunt realized these robots could tackle more tasks than just picking up signals and delivering medicine — they could also become the hospital’s grunt workers. They could pull carts and deliver everything from office supplies to food trays, pick up dirty laundry, and even make sure refrigerators are at their required temperatures. “I could see so many uses in so many areas,” he says.

Still, Dillehunt’s biggest hurdle was convincing a hundred nurses to embrace — not sabotage — the new tracking technology. After all, the robot sentinels would expose each nurse’s secret cache of medical devices. And nurses are notorious for their resistance to change.

So the easygoing Dillehunt turned the discussion toward a common interest. He told nurses that some medical devices weren’t routinely maintained and that it’s in the best interest of the patient that robots identify and bring them in for cleaning. Then he gave the nurses his personal guarantee: There will be a medical device nearby that’s ready to go whenever they need it.

Within a week of RFID deployment, Dillehunt says he “got happy e-mails from some of the nursing managers who used to have complaints about finding this or that.” Ever modest, he gives credit to nurses for their willingness to change — not his negotiation savvy — that led to the success of the project.

“That was a real win for the organization,” Dillehunt says. “A happy nurse is something we all dream about.”