Identity tags can cause life saving medical equipment to malfunction

Dutch scientists are suggesting that radio frequency identification devices (RFIDs) could cause critical care medical equipment to malfunction.

The scientists from Vrije University in Amsterdam say lifesaving equipment such as ventilators could potentially be affected and be switched off by radio-frequency devices used to track people and machines.

The use of RFIDs has increased considerably in healthcare in helping to identify patients, and track the location of equipment; there are two types, one which transmits information, and another, "passive", device which can be "read" by a powered machine when it is held nearby.

Small, cheap devices are used everyday in society, in everything from security and travel cards, to anti-theft devices on goods in shops.

Hospitals too are now becoming aware of the potential and in some hospitals patients undergoing surgery wear an RFID wristband, so that even when anaesthetised, their full identity, including a picture, can be downloaded.

While the intention is to make patients safer the researchers say the technology will interact with other technology and they say hospitals should be aware of this.

The Dutch research team tested the effect of holding both "passive" and powered RFIDs close to 41 medical devices, including ventilators, syringe pumps, dialysis machines and pacemakers.

In due course a total of 123 tests, three on each machine, were carried out, and 34 produced an "incident" in which the RFID appeared to have an effect - 24 of which were deemed either "significant" or "hazardous".

In some tests, RFIDs either switched off or changed the settings on mechanical ventilators, completely stopped the working of syringe pumps, caused external pacemakers to malfunction, and halted dialysis machines.

The researchers say the device did not have to be held right up to the machine to cause this to happen as some "hazardous" incidents happened when the RFID was more than 10 inches away.

Experts say design in isolation is risky as even the most seductive technology will interact in the tightly-coupled healthcare world in ways physicians and other members of the healthcare team need to understand, or they and their patients will pay.

A spokesman for NHS Connecting for Health, which manages various IT projects across the health service, says that RFIDs have the potential to deliver big improvements in patient safety, by reducing mistakes caused by the wrong identification of patients.

A spokesman for the Medicines and Healthcare Products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) says they have received very few reports of adverse events caused by this problem and for mobile phone use, individual Trusts needed to make risk assessments about the use of RFIDs.

Lead researcher Remko van der Togt says the lack of standardization of RFID in health care allows RFID systems originally designed for logistics to enter the medical arena which requires careful management.

The research is reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.