Utilizing video cameras beyond surveillance in the healthcare industry is growing rapidly, and PTZ cameras have been a large part of that advancement. The automated nature of the cameras and their ease-of-integration, remote control, and custom programming allow healthcare facility operators to enhance the lives of the patients they care for.
Performance Features
To find the right camera for your space and application, study your requirements to match them with the numerous features of the latest PTZ cameras to enhance your setup.
Features like AI auto-tracking, which is now common in PTZ cameras, can assist in following subjects during training scenarios or even keep track of patient movements. A powerful zoom lens with a large optical zoom factor allows you to capture fine detail, and the ability to set presets makes it easy to zoom and frame your subject, as well as tracking micro-movements such as the patient’s eyes, with one click.
Automatic light sensing, night vision, and color correction features can help monitor patients during sleep or in rooms that require lights to be down for technical reasons. Video capture resolutions up to 4K provide fine detail to make accurate diagnoses or monitor critical patients. Also consider where you will save your recordings, whether recording video in camera via SD card, USB out to a hard drive, out to a computer, or saving to the cloud.
On the connectivity side, there are multiple video output choices such as HDMI, SDI, and USB, as well as IP streaming over a network. Many of the latest PTZ camera models support NDI|HX, a high-quality, low-latency protocol that allows you to stream high-resolution video and control data over a single Ethernet cable. If the camera also supports PoE (Power-over-Ethernet), that’s a bonus to connect and power your camera with only a single cable.
Applications
There are numerous uses of PTZ cameras in healthcare beyond security that can assist in making patient care more effective and convenient. Medical training sessions and teaching surgeries are a popular way to reach medical students or colleagues who can’t be in the room for a procedure. Observers and especially camera operators often can’t be in an operating room due to hazardous conditions (e.g. radiation) or a cramped space, and high-quality imagery is required for capturing the finest detail, so a remotely controlled PTZ camera is ideal for those conditions.
Treatment areas like MRI rooms physically separate patients and providers, so PTZ cameras can be helpful to check on a patient’s well-being during treatment while monitoring via equipment in the other room.
Other uses include telemedicine for remote medical consults, and having a PTZ camera with AI tracking can allow a patient to switch to between multiple doctors or have the doctor show results on different screens. Their compact size, such as the Telycam Drive SE+, can fit onto mobile medical carts to bring into different work areas. They can be used as traditional security cameras to monitor open areas, but they can also monitor places like pharmaceutical dispensaries and staff work areas.
Nursing homes, hospital patient rooms, and ICUs are also important areas for closely monitoring patients to prevent falls, keeping a sharp eye on a patient’s condition, or to monitor sleep patterns without the need for constant in-person visits from staff. These prevention methods can enhance patient and caregiver safety as well as the potential of saving on a budget.
Purpose-Built PTZ Cameras
Though many PTZ cameras can handle standard remote control PTZ movements, video output, remote management, and versatile mounting and power options, they aren’t necessarily built to fit into every healthcare environment.
AVer considered the requirements of healthcare facilities and created the MD330UI, which has several features that are specific to medical facilities. First, the camera head is removable, so nurses/medical assistants can get it into small areas for doctors either in the room or remotely on a monitor. It also features 360⁰ head movement, a built-in fill light, 4K video capture with AI noise reduction, and a powerful 30x optical zoom lens.
Along with high-quality 4K video capture with a 30x optical zoom lens that can capture fine detail, the BZBGear BG-NUTRIX PTZ camera is also designed with medical-grade solutions for a healthcare facility. This innovative camera includes infrared night vision, integrated stereo speakers, and it is IEC 60601 certified medical grade.
Both the MD330UI and BG-NUTRIX also have a speakerphone and mic for two-way audio communication with noise reduction, so doctors can confer with patients face to face and can hear each other over the din of hospital equipment, background noise, and AC units.
Medical-Grade and Compliance
You may be wondering what the requirements are for a PTZ camera to be “medical grade”. The main test a device must pass to be medical grade is IEC 60601 Medical Certification. This guideline refers to several safety standards that include electromagnetic interference, electrical design, safety features, and required privacy and safety mitigations so the camera doesn’t interfere with medical/surgical equipment or life-saving devices such as pacemakers.
Another consideration is ensuring your cameras and procedures are HIPAA compliant. HIPAA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996) was designed to protect patient healthcare data. Facilities can face large penalties if they do not protect their patients’ privacy, so your cameras need to have certain features to comply.
What makes a camera HIPAA compliant?
You can only allow authorized personnel to access cameras that could capture patient information.
You must use encryption, audit logs, and third-party security audits.
You must avoid placing cameras in areas where patients have a reasonable expectation of privacy, like bathrooms or changing rooms.
The camera should have a blur or disable audio function to prevent PHI (protected health information) from being recorded.
You must restrict display access by keeping monitors in restricted areas.
Staff should be trained in how to properly use security cameras and systems.
Video data should be stored in a cloud-based system instead of on physical servers so they are backed up and secure, or there should be a procedure to store secure data centrally.
For patient communication, use HIPAA compliant software such as Zoom, VSee, or Microsoft Teams.
Security
Privacy and security are serious considerations, and that also includes network security and physical privacy on the camera itself. Some cameras have built-in encryption, but if they do not, using transport protocols like NDI can not only achieve high-quality video and low latency, but there is also a level of security in the data as NDI-capable software or hardware decoders are required to view the stream. You can also utilize secure software that supports encryption such as AES 256-bit to transmit your video data.
Where you save your video data is also a consideration, and while your organization can have procedures to secure backups, companies like PTZOptics created their own systems to securely save to the cloud. HIVE, the PTZOptics cloud service, not only allows you to save video data but you can also share camera control, create private streams, and securely share recordings.
Access to your cameras, computer, monitors, and controllers should also be physically locked down, and passwords should only be shared with authorized individuals. Kensington lock slots on the cameras, monitors, and controllers are also a great theft-preventing feature.
Privacy features on the cameras themselves are important for patient privacy, as well as to be HIPAA compliance. Features such as lens blinds, software mosaic / blur modes, or automatic movements to face down or to the wall are great additions to a healthcare-ready camera.
Case Study
There are many partnerships that healthcare providers can take advantage of to enhance their patient care with PTZ cameras. Canon’s CR-N300 4K PTZ cameras have been used extensively in healthcare environments, such as in in this case study for Swedish pathology labs.
This case study of PTZOptics cameras with Bretford and Howard Medical carts shows an innovative use of paired technology.
(Note: they mention Bretford carts in this video and we do sell Bretford products, but we do not sell Howard Medical carts but since this is a specific vertical there will be many items we do not sell relating to this subject)
