Design and development of integrated portable pre-analytical phlebotomy unit (IP3U)

Abstract

Pre-analytical phase in phlebotomy process contributes 62% of errors in the process. This contributes to blood sample rejection that leads to diagnostic and treatment delay and even patient death, a solution is needed to solve the problem related to this issue. Integrated Portable Pre-Analytical Phlebotomy Unit (IP3U) is a device that includes implementation of artificial intelligence (AI) Deep Learning based Optical Character Recognition (OCR) using Tesseract and OpenCV for patient information processing, an image-guided vein diameter visualization for specific needle determination for drawing blood from veins, an automated time response sequence order of blood draw unit, blood specimen volume quantitative analysis using computerized vision, artificial inversion module able immediate mixing of the sample upon blood collection and a specimen storage compartment with temperature monitoring and most important feature with QR code-based patient-sample positive identification system. The device provides an accurate and qualified blood specimen during the pre-analytical at bedsides or in ambulances, emergency rooms, clinics and doctors’ offices to diminish the human manual control error that greatly reduce the specimen rejection rate with interconnection via the internet of computing devices for quality monitoring.