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A Look at Gaming Carts Designed for Hospitals

By Rain Noe - October 1, 2020

Gaming carts are furniture objects that have found their place in hospitals, typically in Pediatric Wards. They can be wheeled out of a storage closet and into a patient's room, and easily gotten out of the way when not needed. This model here, the FLE Arcade Cart II by Fully Loaded Electronics, takes its design cues from other types of medical carts; it has the narrowest-possible footprint and is touted for being easy to clean.

FLE Arcade Cart II by Fully Loaded Electronics

This Go-Go Gamer Cart by PDi Communication Systems is designed specifically to hold a Playstation 4, which seems a poor choice in terms of future-proofing.

Go-Go Gamer Cart by PDi Communication Systems

This Hygia VHA Gaming Cart by Parity Medical has a foot-pedal-operated height adjustment system and a tiltable/extendable screen mount, so it can be used at either chair height or bed height. All of the cables are enclosed, making it easier to clean than the FLE above.

Hygia VHA Gaming Cart by Parity Medical

Another design offered by Fully Loaded is this Go Kart, which securely encloses the gaming console, presumably for situations where it might otherwise go missing. It's sad to think that someone might steal a gaming console from the Pediatric Ward of a hospital, but I suppose that's the world we live in.

Go Kart

None of these units list prices on their websites; you must instead contact them for quotes. But I found an article from a local news network in Kentucky that told of a charity organization enabling the purchase of a Go Kart unit for the Pediatric Unit at the Mercy Health - Lourdes Hospital in Paducah. The precise price of the unit was not listed, but the article mentions that "The purchase was made possibly by a $3,500 grant from the Honorable Order Kentucky Colonels."

Image: WPSD News

Furthermore, the Charity Gaming website, which solicits donations for gaming carts, has $5,000 set as the default donation.

Gaming carts for hospitals doesn't appear to be a terribly competitive space; the manufacturers above were the only three I could turn up. I think there's some room for innovation and price-competitiveness here, or at least a senior thesis project with an unassailable goal: Making these more affordable.

Comments

David Palmer

a year ago

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I'm inclined to argue that the most effective point of intervention would not be to design a more affordable gaming cart but rather a means for healthcare systems' procurement offices to better navigate the marketplace.

When you think of all the potential hazards/liabilities introduced by any fixture that ends up on a hospital floor, they want reassurance. It's not enough that a product is well designed, but that it's verifiable for being safe. Certifications and brand reputation are costly - there's seldom a way around that. A similar challenge has long plagued the organic foods markets - many producers are organic, but can't justify the price of certifying it. Or, they cannot connect to the right distributors, so they sell their organic product into the conventional supply chain (coffee epitomizes this issue).

It's worth mentioning that while that space may not seem competitive, premier healthcare systems typically aren't the most price sensitive customers. Meanwhile, many community healthcare systems are seldom in a position to purchase niceties at all. A purchasing officer in a cash-strapped org will sooner go without, than stick their neck out buying a new entrant in the marketplace.

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- David Palmer
  
  David Palmer
  
  a year ago
  
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  To provide a micro-economic example. I myself am a clinician. What stethoscope do I own? A 3M Littmann Cardio IV; remarkably expensive. I'm absolutely certain there are better values on the market, but I cannot justify the time finding it. My time is best spent practicing medicine. Similarly, the Welch-Allyn thermometers are ridiculously expensive and are "calibrated" to only use their own brand's probe covers. But until someone can present me a compelling case that another market entrant is of comparable quality, I won't be spending the time to find it.
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Rain Noe

I’m a lapsed industrial designer. I was born in NYC and figured I’d die there, but a few years ago I abandoned New York to live on a farm in the countryside with my wife. We have six dogs.