Patent ID: 7256708

Claim:
A hospitalized patient care system comprising: a telecommunication network; monitoring stations comprising monitoring equipment adapted to monitor data elements from geographically dispersed hospitalized patients and to send the monitored data elements to a remote command center via the telecommunications network, wherein the remote command center is adapted to: receive the monitored data elements from the geographically dispersed hospitalized patients; access patient data elements indicative of a medical condition associated with each of the geographically dispersed hospitalized patients; establish patient-specific rules associated with each of the geographically dispersed hospitalized patients; and apply the patient-specific rules continuously and simultaneously using a rules engine adapted to: select data elements from the monitored data elements and the patient data elements associated with a hospitalized patient; apply a patient-specific rule associated with the hospitalized patient to the selected data elements; determine in an automated fashion at the remote command center whether the patient-specific rule for the hospitalized patient has been contravened; and in the event the patient-specific rule for the hospitalized patient has been contravened, issue an alert from the remote command center.