Ottawa hospital procures Able Innovation’s patient transfer solution

Able Innovation’s robotic patient transfer platform has found a home in Ottawa.

The company’s ALTA platform, which enables hands-free patient transfer, will be used at Saint-Vincent Hospital, a complex care unit of the Elisabeth Bruyère health network.

Jayiesh Singh, Able Innovations CEO, says that since joining Velocity and the University of Waterloo innovation ecosystem, the company has forged meaningful connections to advance the platform from concept to small scale product, around three feet in size, to a large-scale, operational prototype that transfers patients without putting clinical staff or patients at risk.

Able Innovation developed the prototype in collaboration with the hospital’s researchers with funding from Ontario Bioscience Innovation Organization (OBIO) and AGE-WELL, an aging related health technology network.

Singh says current patient transfer methods pose a high risk of injury to staff, decreasing staff productivity. Patients also bemoan this manual transfer process, often calling it undignified.

“(Saint-Vincent) caters to a high rate of geriatric patients who need to be moved in a supine manner, which requires two to eight staff, using our platform it takes only one staff to do it independently,” Singh says. “This allows staff to focus on the patient, leaving patients feeling more cared for.”