Bathroom Blindspot Reminder Sheet
This document is for use by staff who have been trained to use Oxevision. You must be trained to use the system. Your Oxehealth Champion can arrange this for you or ask your manager.
What are they?
Bathroom / Blindspot alerts are designed to notify staff when activity has been detected entering an area of the room not visible to Oxevision and there is no further activity in the main room for a prolonged period. This can indicate to staff that a person has been in the bathroom or blindspot for a prolonged period, so they can make an additional check on them.
Prior to a Bathroom / Blindspot alert being triggered, Oxevision will display an “In Bathroom” warning state once the system is confident that the person has entered this region and there is no movement detected elsewhere in the room (see Reminder Sheet on “Room States”). This warning state displays a timer for how long the person has been there, which then turns into an alert after a set number of minutes or seconds. This is usually 3 minutes but is tailored for individual wards.*
*Bathroom / Blindspot warnings and alerts can indicate a person may be in the bathroom or a blindspot. Please remember that Oxevision only provides location and activity based alerts and warnings and, as a result, may trigger an unexpected Bathroom / Blindspot warning or alert in response to other activity in these areas, or miss a warning or alert when a person is in the bathroom or blindspot under some circumstances. You should never rely solely on the system to ensure patient safety and always carry out your usual in-person safety checks. For more information, please refer to the ‘Are there any limitations?’ section below.
How do they help?
Bathroom / Blindspot alerts are intended to help staff in caring for their patients by providing information on their whereabouts which can be useful in helping to determine who may need help or assistance.
Self-harm or misadventure often occurs in a patient’s bathroom so staff can be notified when activity indicates that a patient has spent an unusually long time in an area considered to be high risk.
How do they work?
Oxevision “sees” movement in the room, much like a human eye does. It knows where critical areas in the room are, including the bathroom door or any blindspots identified during the installation process. It uses movement into these areas to determine when someone has entered the bathroom or blindspot.
Staff will see an “In Bathroom” or “In Blindspot” warning state up to 40 seconds after the patient has entered the bathroom or blindspot. If enabled, Oxevision will then trigger a Bathroom / Blindspot alert after a set number of minutes or seconds if the patient remains there.
The Bathroom / Blindspot alert will persist until a member of staff resets it.
When staff resets an alert and patient remains in the bathroom, an ‘In Bathroom/Blindspot’ warning will be displayed and the timer continues to clock up. Some organisations have chosen to have repeat alerts while the patient remains in the bathroom so as long as the warning state persists, they will continue to get alerts in set intervals following each alert reset.
Let’s look at an example…
A patient enters their bathroom and remains there for 4 minutes before going back into the main room. Their bedroom is configured to trigger a Bathroom alert after 3 minutes of dwell time.
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- If the Bathroom alert is reset within 1 minute while the patient is still in the bathroom, Oxevision would revert to showing an “In Bathroom” warning state
- If the Bathroom alert is reset after 1 minute and after the patient has left the bathroom, Oxevision would show “In Room”.
Are there any limitations?
We make every effort to ensure the optimal performance of Oxevision. However, it is important to know that as we work on making continuous improvements to the system, there are a few situations to be mindful of. If you’re ever in doubt, you can always reach out to Oxehealth who are available 24/7.
Incorrect room state
If a patient is in the bathroom or blindspot and an alert is triggered, a staff member enters the room to check on them, and then leaves the room while the patient remains in the bathroom (and therefore isn’t visible to Oxevision).
This may result in the room tile showing “In Room” and then "Empty" once the staff member leaves the room, rather than remaining as “In Bathroom” or "In Blindspot" which could result in discontinuation of the bathroom/blindspot warning and missed bathroom or blindspot alerts.
Incorrectly detecting spurious movement
Occasionally, Oxevision may detect activity that hasn’t come from a person and incorrectly believe a bedroom has become occupied despite it being empty. When it can no longer detect activity, Oxevision can then incorrectly assume that the person has disappeared into the bathroom or blindspot. Oxevision can then get stuck in the “In Bathroom” or “In Blindspot” state since it won’t register seeing someone leave again, and therefore trigger an alert after the defined period. One example of this is an insect flying across the room from the main doorway towards the bathroom. Another example is activity from a bathroom door or curtain left swinging shortly after a person has left their room.
On rare occasions, spurious movement in the main room may also prevent Oxevision correctly registering “In Bathroom” and starting the bathroom timer alert within the expected 40 second period when someone has entered the bathroom. This could delay or even prevent an “In Bathroom” alert being triggered.
Finally, Oxevision is designed to only restart the Bathroom timer while in an “In Bathroom” state when it detects activity in the main room and not in the bathroom doorway as it appears from the perspective of the camera. This is to help prevent a short period of activity, for example a member of staff popping their head in the room or temporary spurious movement, from delaying a Bathroom timer alert. This means that a patient pacing in and out of the bathroom for a sustained period could trigger a Bathroom timer alert. This also means that after the person has passed through the bathroom doorway and into the main room the system may continue to show “In Bathroom” until a short period of time after the patient has moved away from the doorway as it appears from the perspective of the camera.
Incorrectly detecting movement from sunlight
Similarly to spurious movement from objects or insects in the room (see above), sunlight can also be a confounder if it causes moving patterns in the room. Oxevision has been designed to recognise and filter out sunlight effects as much as possible, and generally speaking, bright, direct sunlight is easier to filter out.
However, some types of sunlight are harder to spot than others. Bathroom / Blindspot alert accuracy is more likely to be negatively impacted when the sun is lower in the sky in south facing rooms and when the sunlight passes through something that causes its appearance to frequently change, for example:
- In winter when the sunlight is coming through trees outside
- When people regularly walk past the window of a ground floor room
- On partially cloudy days with sunlight flickering between clouds.
This can result in delayed Bathroom / Blindspot alerts if movement from sunlight coincides with a person’s entry into the bathroom region and it therefore takes longer to show “In Bathroom” first.
Mixed up bathroom entries and room exits
Unexpected or missed Bathroom / Blindspot alerts can arise in bedrooms where the main doorway is close to the bathroom door from the perspective of the camera. If the person moves very quickly across the bathroom and main doorways, Oxevision can occasionally misinterpret which doorway they have passed through. Software improvements have been targeted at reducing the risk of this happening.
Oxevision is designed to overcome these challenges and configuration changes are possible to minimise the risk of repeat issues. Please contact Oxehealth via the Feedback Form if you spot an incorrect or missed Bathroom / Blindspot alert.
Things to remember!
- Oxevision is designed to provide information to staff about whether someone has remained in their bathroom or a known blindspot for a prolonged period, however, you should never rely solely on the system for this purpose and staff should remain vigilant
- For most organisations Oxevision will not trigger successive Bathroom / Blindspot alerts for the same entry. Instead you will get a single alert after a set number of minutes or seconds (in line with local protocol) which then changes to a warning state once the alert is reset if the person remains in the bathroom / blindspot
- Check your local protocol for responding to these types of alerts
- Oxehealth is available 24/7 if you need support and would like to query the performance of Oxevision.
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