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'Repeatable Sanitization' is a Feature of PCs Now (theregister.co.uk)
HP has announced a trio of slightly-odd products intended for use in hospitals. From a report: The new HP EliteOne 800 G4 23.8 Healthcare Edition All-in-One PC and HP EliteBook 840 G5 Healthcare Edition Notebook are computers intended for use in the healthcare industry. The EliteBook will ship with software called "Easy Clean" that disables the keyboard, touchscreen and keypad "to facilitate cleaning with germicidal wipes while the device is still on." HP said it's scoured the market and thinks it is the only vendor on the planet with a laptop capable of handling "up to 10,000 wipes with germicidal towelettes over a 3-year period." The All-in-One boasts no antibacterial features, but does have both RFID and biometric authentication, handy features in an environment where PCs can't be left unlocked to preserve privacy. That requirement means PCs are logged on to many more times a day than the average machine, making the presence of Windows Hello facial recognition more than a gimmick. Oddly, both come with the disclaimer that they're "not intended for use in diagnosis, cure, treatment or prevention of disease or other medical conditions."
from the new-hot-trend dept.
More like the straight out of a press release department.
I thought initially this would be about the ability to properly wipe the device's storage. Now that would have been useful...
Ezekiel 23:20
Oddly, both come with the disclaimer that they're "not intended for use in diagnosis, cure, treatment or prevention of disease or other medical conditions."
I bet without this disclaimer, the PC would be subject to FDA regulations, and require clinical trials.
One of our competitors trademarked the term "hypothesis". From now on, we will call them "boneheaded ideas".
FYI: I work in the medical industry, and Advantech and Cybernet are two companies that make these types of all-in-one devices. The ones I have around me are at least IP65 rated and fanless. We actually do accelerated bleach tests on them because the screens on some older devices would fade to white since the touch-screens had a plastic covering.
HP EliteOne 800 G4 23.8 PORNHUB Edition All-in-One PC and HP EliteBook 840 G5 PORNHUB Edition Notebook.
There, you're welcome. HP can't market their way out of a wet paper bag.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
I'm waiting for a laptop that is dishwasher safe.
They're all dishwasher safe. Give it a try. Your dishwasher will be fine.
He's getting rather old, but he's a good mouse.
I've been doing this for years in Linux, I even have a shell script for it:
$ cat disable-laptop-keyboardmouse.sh
#!/bin/sh
xinput --disable 'AT Translated Set 2 keyboard'
xinput --disable 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad'
$ cat enable-laptop-keyboardmouse.sh
#!/bin/sh
xinput --enable 'AT Translated Set 2 keyboard'
xinput --enable 'SynPS/2 Synaptics TouchPad'
At cleaning time:
$ disable-laptop-keyboardmouse.sh; sleep 2m; enable-laptop-keyboardmouse.sh
Windows 8 and later will wake up and prompt for a password on any keypress. You can still revert to the old behaviour by setting a GPO.
Cleaning the computer is so low down the list of concerns for computers for healthcare.
Real issues...
1. Security: These devices need to be secure in many ways.
a. Physical Lock down, so they can't be taken away.
b. Data access ports should be locked into the pc's and free ports need to be disabled or blocked off.
c. Screen polarization. Only the person using the computer should see what is on the screen.
d. Fast authentication where the user can log-off an login easily and quickly to a system.
2. Networking: The PC will need to access the network reliability and quickly.
3. Performance: Health care data is big, there is a lot of data going across. So these systems will need to quickly work on such data.
4. Easy to Replace: if it fails, it needs to be able to be replaced quickly.
5. Affordability: Most Health Care Orgs are not for profit, and don't want to wast more money then needed.
6. Robust: They will be moved around a lot, bumped, dropped, spilled on, out in the cold or extreme heat, near magnets and radiation.
7. ADA ready: Big screens that are easy to read, easy to do user input on, etc...
8. Looks modern: sounds stupid, however when patients go into a health care settings, and they see modern systems, vs older looking one, they feel the place is more sanitary and they will take better care of you.
9. Easy to clean: this is way down on the list, because for the most part they are already being used in a clean environment. The computers are often far enough away from patients so they are not putting their germs on it, the hospitals have a good air filter system that keeps dust and other contaminates way down. Staff tying on the computer doesn't do it with their gloves on after touching patients. Using a computer in a hospital isn't any more dirty then a PC in your office, probably it is actually cleaner.
10. Long term vendor support. In many ways this could be listed in the #1 spot. But I gave it #10 because that is the easiest feature you can find.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
A new dishwasher, using distilled water and no detergents or other agents, would work just fine.
That's basically what gets done to remove the water-soluble flux after a reflow operation on a repair batch of boards, anyways.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
If it's a desktop PC, leaving one INTERNAL USB port enabled is an option.
otherwise, FDA might consider it a medical device, and 8 years of tests would follow. I'm serious.
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Have you ever tried one of those "rollable" silicone keyboards? Those are horrible to use. There is no stability in the keys, and when you try to press one it wants to move your finger to the side.
There are however also splash-proof keyboards where there is a regular keyboard underneath a flexible membrane. Those have much better feel and accuracy.
BTW, the keyboard that comes with this machine looks like a membrane keyboard, but I suspect that it could be a touch pad.
"We mustn't be caught by surprise by our own advancing technology" -- Aldous Huxley