Norm compliance for network connections

摘要

Manufacturers of medical technology or IT vendors integrating applications into hospital network environments are faced with the problem of having to supply network connections that are suitable for medical devices. That is no easy job, if expensive and risky external insulators are to be avoided. Networks in hospitals, rehabilitation centers and medical practices are constantly expanding and taking on more and more devices. The aim is to improve efficiency in the whole clinic process flow by means of integrated systems and increased communication. For example, X-Ray pictures can be transmitted to desktop PCs and even to smartphones, information from hundreds of sensors and actuators at the Point-of-Care can be accessed by workstations on the hospital wards and data from operations is stored on central servers for documentation purposes. Even the patient emergency call will in future be run over the network. There is hardly any application - and certainly not any undergoing current development - which is destined to be operated on a stand-alone basis. And the IT backbone is Ethernet-based, or wireless connections are used for mobile peripherals. That explains why an increasingly colourful jumble of conventional IT and medical technology devices is currently at large in hospitals.