Waikato Hospital
The Client
Waikato District Health Board (DHB) is one of 20 district health boards in New Zealand. District health boards are responsible for providing or funding the provision of health services in their district.
The Waikato DHB serves a population of more than 390,000 and covers more than 21,000km2. It stretches from northern Coromandel to close to Mt Ruapehu in the south, and from Raglan on the West Coast to Waihi on the east.
Scope & Challenges Faced
Security is a key component for the Waikato Hospital to ensure that both staff and patients are safe at all times.
Due to there being 5 hospitals spread across the region under the care of the DHB security team, the sheer size of the complexes and that operations are centralized from the Hamilton hospital, a reliable, scalable, easy to use and cost-effective solution was required.
The DHB have used Hytera radios for the past 5 years and whilst voice communications were always good, there was a need to know where their guards were to improve their safety and in order to be able to react quickly with the nearest guard to any situation.
It was also imperative that the new solution be able to link all 4 regional hospitals back to the control centre at the Hamilton hospital.
This was also the first installation of Hytera Patrol in Australasia, so there was a steep learning curve for all involved.
The System
In 2016, the DHB contacted Dove Communications, a regional New Zealand Hytera dealer with offices in Hamilton and Auckland, to recommend a solution to meet all of their needs
Dove proposed the Hytera PD782G digital radios with integrated RFID and Patrol. This meant that instead of having to rely on voice communications to know the whereabouts of staff, team members could use the radios themselves thanks to Hytera’s RFID tagging technology.
Security teams can now be seen patrolling their designated routes. The new patrol software not only ensures that their location is registered but also that each interaction with a checkpoint is logged against an individual, which was not previously possible. This information can be displayed on a stand-alone monitor in the control room which shows all checkpoint locations.
In partnership with the hospital security team, Dove Communications installed the system throughout the hospitals and supported the teams by training them how to use their new radios.
The Outcome
Feedback is that the handsets are rugged, extremely user-friendly and that interaction with the patrol beacons is very easy.
However, the biggest upside to the hospital is that they no longer have to constantly contact team members in order to know their whereabouts.
Having individuals tagged to a checkpoint location adds a layer of data for due diligence purposes that they didn’t have before.
This helps the hospital demonstrate safety and enables it to react very quickly to any situation using the closest resource.
David Wilson, security and parking manager, chose the system that delivered safety first and with that, they have also improved their due diligence and record-keeping.
What’s your Communication Challenge?
Call us and ask for one of our sales engineers and let us work with you to find a solution.
Other Case Studies
Mangatangi Farm
Lying pinned under a quad bike rolled is no fun. For Dave it was an excruciating 45 minute wait until help came. While he had a CB radio to talk to other farm staff, no one was listening at the time his quad rolled. Fortunately, his injuries weren’t too serious.
Fonterra Tanker Fleet
Fonterra recently returned to Digital Mobile Radio for their in-Tanker voice communications. Experience had taught them that cellular coverage was not always available where they needed.
Festival One
Festival One is multi-day, Christian Festival on Auckland & Waikato Anniversary Weekend. Located at Hartford, 209 Whitehall Road, Karapiro. Festival One is in its eleventh year and has a broad range of fantastic artists, lots of opportunities for the creative arts and a few other surprises.