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EDIS© - Emergency Data Interchange System

Product focus: Saves lives Documentation

Emergency Response, Track and Trace for the 21st Century

CWC Services has been in the emergency documentation business since 1985. Our first product was the Cruciform® Triage Card or Tag. Continuously improved over the years, it is flexible, adaptable and can show victim improvement as well as deterioration. It uses medically developed Casualty Assessment and Trauma Score modules. The International Cruciform®, a variant developed for the North American market, added a Prehospital and CBRNE/Hazmat assessment module.

Building upon our proven Cruciform Triage systems, we developed the Cruciform Patient Evacuation System (CPES©), designed to help hospital staff to manage that most difficult situation, a planned or emergency hospital evacuation. CPES is now used in UK hospitals including the Royal Free London NHS Foundation Trust and Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells NHS Trust.

More recently we have developed the Local Authority Rest Centre System (LARCS). Still in development, the system enables rest centre staff to track individuals and related family members to or from different holding facilities as a result of a large scale emergency evacuation from a town or area.

All three manual systems use GS1 barcodes to uniquely identify people, their relationships and belongings.

Using the same GS1 barcodes, we've developed an electronic system
to dramatically improve emergency information flow still further:
 EDIS

What is EDIS?

EDIS is a software system comprising mobile handset and server-based components. The system uses GS1 barcodes to identify individuals, the same as those already used in our manual systems. The handset software facilitates barcode scanning and allows information about the individual to be gathered and linked to the barcode. Photographic capture and text/voice data-entry are supported currently.

Information gathered is synchronised with a server when data connectivity is available to the handset. Any other handset snapping the same barcode automatically obtains the latest information pertaining to it, and can optionally make further changes which in turn become available for other handsets in the future. In this way, patients are "tracked" chronologically through the changing dynamics of an incident, for example as they move from one location to another or their state of wellbeing changes over time. All future enquiries about a patient obtain the most up-to-date information where possible.

Any enquiry or change to information by any handset is logged in a detailed audit of events that occur to individuals in space and time, along with the handset user responsible. The audit facility permits real-time or after-the-event analysis via computer-based administration modules or optionally from the handset software itself.

We envisage the use of EDIS primarily in the following scenarios, but the flexible architecture of EDIS permits adaptation to virtually any situation where people need to be tracked across locations and information about them may change over time:

  1. Handling people involved in small or large scale accidents or incidents
    Staff using EDIS: First Response, Medical organisations and other authorised agencies
  2. Planned or Unplanned (unexpected) hospital evacuation
    Staff using EDIS: Hospital staff and assisting teams
  3. Large-scale disaster requiring public evacuation to holding facilities (eg. flood)
    Staff using EDIS: Local authorities, Police, Military and other authorised agencies

Key Benefits

  • Revolutionary. An unprecedented development in medical, emergency and evacuation situation management that allows near-instant access to information by professionals both in the field and at base of operations, across distances and over time in the incident dynamic.
  • Increase efficiency of emergency staff resources. Improve coordination and resilience within and between organisations.
  • Substantial time savings allow staff to be more productive because there is less need for manual written records
  • Up-to-the-minute information is synchronised at the scene via data-link and available throughout the organisation
  • Information about patients/evacuees can be instantly available to attending staff in the field or at base of operations
  • Staff will have the facility to locate individuals eg. when trying to find "missing" family members. In the chaos of a major disaster this could represent substantial time-savings and avoid repeat phone-calls
  • Senior staff will be more effective as patient/victim information, timelines and statistics will be available on their computers. Additional analysis and reports about an incident could be available in the moment or after the event
  • Regional/national government could monitor displaced populations after major incidents and reallocate resources more rapidly to meet demand.
  • Reduce stress and anxiety for victims and their relatives who can be more quickly brought together.
  • Facilitate legal duty of care for doctors who can track evacuated patients' whereabouts rapidly continue patient care by liaison with another clinician.
  • Accurately track and trace victims/patients throughout the incident, even during transport eg. by ambulance services. Reduce "loss" of individuals in the chaos of an incident.
  • Hospitals, Police and other relevant organisations can track individuals, obtain and communicate information about them, and monitor their movements throughout the incident
  • Coroners can get continuity of evidence with greater accuracy and speed.
  • Uses the GS1 numbering and bar code system to track patients, the system mandated by the UK Department of Health for all products coming into the NHS. "The expectation is that all products should be identifiable by or carry GS1 bar codes by the end of 2012". More information

More Information

We believe that EDIS© is an unprecedented development in emergency and evacuation response and management. So far as we are aware, nothing like it exists and the possibilities and applications for this technology are virtually limitless. As a result, the system has been developed as a fully working "proof of concept" to demonstrate unique capabilities that most applications would share in common. Features and requirements for particular organisations - including special data fields, security, information access/privilege levels as well as administration and analysis tools - are not present in EDIS currently, as these would depend entirely upon the requirements of interested organisations.

We are keen to continue EDIS development towards deployment in scenarios such as those outlined above. This would involve some time, financial cost and a close working relationship with interested parties. We invite representatives to get in touch to see the cost-saving, organisational and healthcare benefits EDIS could bring to your organisation.

Click here for detailed information about the EDIS© system, its architecture and design ideology.

We welcome any enquiry or feedback. You can use This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. or social media, or use our contact form to get in touch.