The RTLS platform now enables panic-button protection outdoors—extending support to parking lots, garages, and walking paths.

Kontakt.io, specializing in AI-powered real-time-location systems (RTLS) for healthcare operations, announced an expansion of its Staff Safe workplace violence prevention solution to include full outdoor coverage. Hospitals can now provide staff protection beyond the indoors and throughout their campuses—including parking lots, garages, drop-off zones, and walking paths—using a single, integrated RTLS platform.

“Most staff safety systems stop at the hospital doors. We went further, adding a one-mile-radius outdoor coverage zone: a seamless Blue-Zone safety net that stretches from the nurse’s station to the farthest open-air parking stall,” says Rom Eizenberg, chief revenue officer at Kontakt.io, in a release. “We took our solution that currently guards tens of thousands of caregivers in leading health systems and stretched it across the entire campus.”

How It Works

Staff Safe equips nurses, aides, and other team members with Bluetooth low-energy smart badges featuring discreet panic buttons. With a press, staff can summon help, triggering a duress alert that shares the staff member’s real-time location and dispatches responders, whether indoors or outdoors.

The outdoor extension includes:

  • LoRaWAN-based outdoor gateways for long-range, campus-wide connectivity
  • Bluetooth low-energy-enabled smart badges with new usability upgrades
  • Indoor base stations for seamless and precise location triangulation
  • Cloud-native platform for analytics, reporting, and infrastructure management

Next-Gen Hardware: Smart Badge 3 Mini

Kontakt.io also announced the release of the Smart Badge 3 Mini, a purpose-built wearable for clinical environments. The smaller badge joins the original Smart Badge in the company’s IoT portfolio. 

Key improvements include:

  • Lighter, smaller form factor for 24/7 wearability and comfort
  • Larger recessed panic button to reduce false activations
  • Haptic feedback to confirm alert transmission for badge wearer
  • Four-year battery life, minimizing operational overhead

“Healthcare leaders must treat staff safety as an organizational priority, not an isolated feature of healthcare operations. Kontakt.io’s Staff Safe solution not only empowers nurses and clinicians with instant, location-aware support but also sends a clear message that their well-being is a priority—indoors and out,” says Mary Beth Kingston, PhD, RN, FAAN, former executive vice president and CNO at Advocate Health and current member of Kontakt.io’s healthcare advisory board, in a release. 

Kontakt.io’s AI-powered RTLS platform does more than address staff duress. It also serves as a unified infrastructure enabling asset tracking and “right-sizing,” patient throughput optimization, regulatory compliance, and more. 

Currently, Kontakt.io partners with Northeast Georgia Health System, the Veterans Health Administration, and Genesis HealthCare System, among others.

Photo caption: Safe Staff

Photo credit: Kontakt.io