Security

Review: Protect Healthcare Staff and Patients With Complete Awareness

Designed to replace complex surveillance networks built with multiple devices, this dome camera gives users situational awareness in all directions.

John Breeden II

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John Breeden II is an award-winning reviewer and public speaker with 20 years of experience covering technology.

The increasing frequency of ransomware threats and attacks have spurred healthcare organizations to focus on cybersecurity defenses. However, physical security at hospitals and clinics is still a major concern and can be just as challenging.

Most healthcare facilities, especially large ones, employ security guards, but they can’t be everywhere at once. Surveillance cameras may offer more visibility, but older models are designed to look only in one direction; even if placed on motorized mounts, they can still see only what is in front of them, limiting coverage. But installing multiple cameras looking in all directions creates a surplus of feeds for guards to monitor.

Enter the Rhombus R360 fisheye camera, designed with the sprawling environments of healthcare facilities in mind. It’s made with a specialized lens that can look in almost all directions at the same time, enabling a single device to efficiently watch over an area that might have once required a dozen forward-facing cameras.

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Setup Is Simple with the Rhombus R360 Fisheye Camera

Easy to set up, the Rhombus R360 comes with tools for attaching the small domelike device to a ceiling or wall, and special brackets for mounting it on a pole or wherever a camera is needed.

The camera’s casing is waterproof and can withstand extreme high or low temperatures, making it suitable for both indoor or outdoor use. No need for a power cable; with its support for Power over Ethernet, the camera needs only a single network cable to be operational.

Finally, because the camera’s software is configured via the cloud, nontechnical hospital staff can mount the new devices while IT teams work remotely to set them up.

Enhance Monitoring of Healthcare Facilities to Keep People Safe

Once in place, the Rhombus R360 uses its 12-megapixel image sensor to provide a highly detailed, full-color view of everything happening around it. The unique fisheye lens is able to give 180-degree views both horizontally and vertically.

If security guards watching the feed notice something suspicious, they can pan and tilt the focus and use the 2X digital zoom for a closer look. The camera can provide high-resolution video in low-light conditions, and even has infrared illuminators that can be used to see people or objects up to 16 feet away in almost total darkness.

The R360 comes with a 512-gigabyte microSD card that can store up to 30 days of video feeds in the camera itself. Beyond that, it’s easy to set up a data dump to a cloud server so whatever the camera sees is saved for later reference.

The Rhombus R360 fisheye camera excels at monitoring everything around it and eliminates the need for multiple cameras. It would be a great addition to enhance the security of any healthcare campus.

SPECIFICATIONS

PRODUCT TYPE: Fixed-mount panoramic security camera
MAXIMUM IMAGE QUALITY: Full-color feeds at 3008x3008 resolution
POWER CONNECTION: Supports Power over Ethernet, 9.9 watts
OPERATIONAL TEMPERATURE RANGE: –22 to 131 degrees Fahrenheit
ONBOARD STORAGE: 512GB microSD card
DIMENSIONS: 5.1 x 5.1 x 2.3 inches

How to Keep Hospitals Safe for Patients and Staff

The unique design of the Rhombus R360 fisheye camera is impressive. In testing, it clearly showed everything happening around it, both vertically and horizontally. I began the testing process with the camera outside in a clear area, measuring how far it could accurately see while still providing a high-resolution feed that was detailed enough to be useful for security teams.

With that in hand, a trip to a busy city hospital offered a helpful comparison and allowed me to estimate how many cameras could be realistically consolidated given the range and capabilities of the Rhombus R360.

The hospital I visited is an older one, though it has had renovations over the years and still serves as a primary healthcare facility for the area.

In the visitor’s parking lot, there were four streetlight poles that each had four cameras mounted near the top, with each camera facing a single direction. Given the range of the Rhombus R360, those camera nests could be eliminated, and two Rhombus units mounted on poles on either side of the lot would be enough to cover the entire area. In that small parking lot alone, the hospital could replace 16 cameras with two R360s.

Next, I headed toward the emergency room entrance. Two more cameras were mounted at the corner of the building, with one facing in each direction. Here, a single R360 would eliminate the need for both cameras.

At the door, a camera was mounted facing out, and another camera was on the ceiling of a small vestibule. Inside the ER waiting room, there were five cameras, all on the ceiling. One R360 could probably cover the vestibule and the front door, but if security teams wanted a better view outside, both camera mounts could still be used. Inside the waiting room, however, there is little need for five cameras. Two R360s could easily cover the whole area. That would eliminate three more cameras, even if both mounts near the main doorway were kept in place.

My limited survey found an opportunity for the sample hospital to consolidate almost 20 cameras and replace them with just a few Rhombus R360s. That would make monitoring the area much easier for security teams, providing them with high-quality feeds and real-time views of the entire area.