Clinic - Goods Transport

Organisation goods transport

Problem Definition
Every day hospitals require huge amounts of medicine, consumer goods, food, laundry etc. which have to be distributed across the building. In this situation it is vitally important not to exceed certain time schedules.

Solution to the Problem
The application of RFID technology in the university hospital Aachen has enhanced the automation level of the organization and as well improved the performance of the transportation system while the operating costs have decreased. The automatic goods transportation scheme set up in 1982 along with the restructuring of the university hospital manages distribution and recycling of medicine, meals, laundry and other goods in the medical section of the university hospital using a suspension rail system.

The vehicles are directed towards their charge and discharge stations by means of a switch and rail system. Starting from the supply section the individual vehicles are moved towards and back from the various stations of the medical departments.

The decentralized control system is based on a state-of-the-art supervisory panel taking maximum advantage of the LonWorksTM base by using intelligent forecast and optimization formulas.

The central processing unit is replaced by “intelligent” LON junctions mounted in a decentralized array. They control – autonomously, if required – the entire transportation system. They register the movements of the transport baskets, determine their routes and collect the instructions at the charge and discharge stations. This regulation of the course and final destination of the suspension trains is realized via more than 220 intelligent “reading junctions” and more than 80 displays with fixed workstations.

The system itself recognizes the traffic situation in the system and converts the instructions issued by the control panel into optimal driving lanes. The relevant decisions are made autonomously depending on distance, traffic “bottlenecks” and potential deficiencies.

Due to the implementation of specific stability patterns virtually no failures occur. Errors of individual junctions simply require the remaining junctions to direct the traffic flow astray the defective location. Even in case of a breakdown of the control panel the transportation process will be sustained by the LonWorksTM junctions.

The university hospital benefits from the modernization by achieving huge increases in transportation turnover. The results are shortened transport and reaction times and minimized waiting intervals of arriving vehicles allowing an apparently more flexible transportation of goods.

Moreover, the operators obtain a new platform of operating data providing precise information on which transport basket has received, transported and discharged which quantity of goods in which time. This ensures an efficient measurement of the product flow along with a provable control and optimization of all transportation activities.