Robots (albeit not quite as pretty as Salma Hayek in Across The Universe) are replacing humans in a $444m hospital opening in Scotland. They’ll take over some of the more menial duties of ward-workers, including bringing meals and dispensing drugs.
They’ll live underneath the hospital and use service elevators, coming out only to do the aforementioned chores, and other little jobs like disposing of rubbish and cleaning rooms. Humans are still very much in charge at the Forth Valley Royal Hospital though, with staff members using PDAs to control the ‘bots who have a set list of pre-programmed routes. The likelihood of one breaking into the blood bank and stealing the cherry-colored liquid is very slim, by the sounds of it.
Opening in August, it’s the first hospital in the UK to use robots, and is hoped it’ll decrease levels of infection caused by the same person treating patients and handling rubbish. [BBC via TG Daily]
