Radar X
A waste collection solution for healthcare facilities
INTRODUCTION
Radar X is a complete sharps waste collection solution for healthcare facilities. The service aims to make the process of medical waste disposal more efficient and economic by building a decentralised network that distributes the treatment to several autoclaving facilities instead of relying on one central collection unit.
My role
Responsible for research, conceptualization, user interface
Team
4 Designer, 1 Mentor
Timeline
December 2020-May 2021
THE CHALLENGE
Our take makes waste mentality
We are depleting our finite resources by following the Take Make Waste paradigm, which encourages raw materials to be collected, transformed into products that are used briefly, and then discarded. This causes material scarcity, disruption of supply chains, and inflation. :(
The Indian subcontinent scenario
India produces about 2 billion tons of waste each year, and during the pandemic this amount quadruples, even the state of art waste management system couldn’t process so much waste, filling landfills at an unprecedented rate
But it didn't stop here
The Vaccination drive, Landfills, and Incineration
With the mission to vaccinate against covid, a nationwide vaccination mission started; this mission vaccinated around 7 billion (at the time of Research, March 2021). An unprecedented amount of syringes were used, which essentially went to landfills or were incinerated, causing loss of semi-precious materials, increased chances of chemical poisoning to workers, and increased events for reuse of unsterile syringes via scavengers.
Opportunity Identified
How might we effectively and ethically treat and dispose sharps waste
RESEARCH AND ANALYSIS
Understanding Hospital scenario - Inside the hospitals
To understand how the syringes finally end ups in the landfill, we track back the journey of syringes - during the journey we identified various stakeholders, and insights were drawn from the stakeholder via interviews, as is scenario mapping, empathy mapping
Research location - New Delhi
Participant of Research- Multi-speciality hospitals, Community hospitals, and Bio-medical waste treatment companies.
Method used - Telephonic interviews, In-person interviews
Waste Management NGO Chintan
Hospital, Nurses, Waste collectors
Bio Medical Waste Treatment Plant
Indian Society of
Hospital Waste Management
Insights and assumptions
In-person visits and research shattered our preassumed workflow of hospital and filled with more concrete insights and more thoughts. The more we listened the greater were our understanding about hospitals
From the multitude of stories that we heard from our primary research, we extracted the ones that stood out for us and mapped them onto our System Map.
This enabled us to focus on the crux
Our preassumptions were shattered and were replaced by new and concrete insights
Need Statement
How might we effectively and ethically treat sharps waste to allow for safer handling and disposal
To understand the granularity of individuals and processes in the vast system, we decided to focus on specific stakeholders: Nurse, Sanitation workers, and BMW worker and to present the insights, let's look at the storyboard below,
Creation
Handling
Managing
These three main stakeholders were the pillars of the waste management in any tertiary hospital in Delhi, these pillars need to work harmoniously with each other to ensure a proper waste management of the hospital
Presenting RADAR-X
Radar X is a complete sharps waste collection solution for healthcare facilities. We deliver our services through a decentralised network that distributes the treatment to several autoclaving facilities instead of relying on a central unit, in the process making disposal efficient and economic.
Let's look at how the solution works
AI Enabled and works on a Data Repository
Caters to the Overlooked users
Focuses on Mutual Value Creation
Readily Scalable
& Easily Expandable
Radar X Worker App
The Radar X worker is responsible for visiting the hospitals on the scheduled date and replacing the filled boxes with clean empty ones. For this the worker scans the qr code on each box and collects them to further autoclave the boxes and the needles/barrels.
Hospital Worker App
The hospital worker is responsible for maintaining a record of the bio medical waste and if it is being treated and disposed ethically. They also make sure that the waste is getting properly segregated and is not mixing up.
Potential Impact
