Abstract
Recently healthcare sector has attracted service robots to prevent the spread of infection. During COVID-19 pandemic, service robots have been able to reduce direct contact of front-line healthcare workers by separating them from direct exposure to infection. Robots have been used for delivery systems, disinfection of the exposed area, remote monitoring of patients, etc. In the present work, we have designed a disinfection robot that radiates ultraviolet C rays for UV sterilization of hospitals that kills 95.0% of bacteria within 20 second of exposure from a distance of 0.5 meter. UVC disinfection is more effective than disinfection by hydrogen peroxide, and with other chemical-based disinfectants like chlorine, chloramine, etc. Our designed robot can also be used as a dispenser in hospital delivery system for transporting medicine, laboratory samples, etc. Its use will not only increase logistics efficiency but will also avoid spread of Hospital Acquired Infections (HAIs), healthcare associated infections, eliminate human error, and allow health workers to engage themselves in their higher priority works.
Highlights
Healthcare associated infections are growing rapidly and has become more apparent in the present time due to COVID19 pandemic
The disinfection capability of our automated designed robot using ultraviolet rays type C (UV-C) LEDs depends upon distance of object to be disinfected and length of time bacteria samples are exposed to the UV-C radiation
With 265 nm wavelength of radiation, it is able kill 95.0% of bacteria within 20 seconds of exposure time when placed at a distance of 0.5 meter
Summary
Healthcare associated infections are growing rapidly and has become more apparent in the present time due to COVID19 pandemic. It has given rise to significant cost due to large number of infected patients, prolonged stay in bed, readmissions, and unprecedented deaths due to outbreak of pandemic. This has put severe social, economic, and clinical burden in the society and on healthcare sectors [1]. Robots can be used in the hospitals for variety of automated services including disinfection of the exposed area, delivery of medicines and remote monitoring of patients, etc. In this paper we have designed a robot for disinfection of the exposed area using Ultraviolet Germicidal Irradiation (UVGI). An alternative to UV-C is the use of far UV-C that emits lower wavelength in the range of 207-222 nm, but its use is at infancy stage and several studies are under progress to verify its effectiveness and challenges for safe uses [6]
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