icomply streamlines Stockton Security’s blood bike rider support service

The safe transportation of urgent blood and human tissue samples between blood banks and hospitals saves lives and NHS transportation costs which are in turn re-directed into front line care. So when Stockton Security Services decided to expand its blood bike rider emergency motorcycle dispatch service from Cleveland Blood run EVS  to neighbouring Northumbria and Cumbria, it knew it was time to review its infrastructure. Relying solely on radio communication to track and monitor despatches was no longer enough; a new command and control centre was needed.  Stockton Security Services chose icomply’s VTAS Pro open integration platform with its dynamic iMAP technology. The solution, which has been live for 12 months now, ensures blood banks, hospitals and other blood and tissue sampling centres across the region receive lifesaving samples and supplies on time, every-time. No sweat, no tears, just blood.

“icomply’s dynamic iMAP technology enables us to track all our riders, wherever they are. Each rider has a lone working and tracking device, which uses GPS tracking and has two-way speech and panic alarm facilities. Each rider’s position is displayed live in our control room on icomply’s VTAS Pro open integration platform,” “cross border handovers and cooperation are coordinated and logistically synchronised” explains Stockton Security’s Graeme Small Assistant Security Services Manager.

“This means we can now track all blood riders on live maps anywhere within the UK and we can track and respond to any incident or emergency any rider encounters,” he explains.

Previous to this solution, the control room relied on riders calling on their mobiles to check in whenever problems arose, this had the potential to cause time delays.  The added benefits of the new system include real time progress tracking of samples, refining the timeframe from analysis to treatment for the patient. Additionally the solution has allowed us to provide real time lone worker protection and support for the volunteer riders who operate 24 hours a day, 365 days a year.  It places riders’ safety as priority icomply’s solution has streamlined all communication links, reducing the amount of calls operators and riders take and make, reducing related costs and delays, and increasing riders’ safety and response times.

Michael Gallagher, icomply’s Director of Business Development stated “the opportunity to provide UK wide monitoring of such a critical service was an interesting and challenging project.  Utilising some of the existing systems we have developed on similar asset and personnel monitoring projects we were able to expand this to provide a cost effective monitoring system to this life saving service.

The solution interfaces seamlessly with the existing icomply software at Stockton on Tees ARC, which has 7 x icomply VTAS Pro operator clients and interfaces to concierge, intruder detection, analogue and IP CCTV, lone worker and icomply’s wonderwall display system.”