Mobile dispensing system for medical articles

A management system for managing inventory in a medical cart, the inventory comprising medical articles for dispensing to a particular patient, each of the medical articles being identified by a wireless data carrier which is responsive to electromagnetic energy (EM) of a frequency f1 in response to which the wireless data carrier provides identification data, the management system comprising:

• a metallic enclosure having an internal reading area, the metallic enclosure located within the medical cart and having electrically conductive walls that completely surround the internal reading area, the enclosure having a natural frequency of resonance f2 which is different from the frequency f1 to which the data carriers are responsive, the data carriers not being operationally responsive to frequency f2;
• a probe disposed at an electrically-conductive wall of the metallic enclosure and configured to inject EM of a frequency f1 into the metallic enclosure, wherein the position of the probe in relation to electrically-conductive walls of the metallic enclosure is selected so that reflected EM of frequency f1 within the metallic enclosure is in phase at the probe position to thereby optimize power transfer at frequency f1 into the enclosure;
• an active impedance matching circuit coupled to the probe and configured to actively match more closely impedance of the probe to impedance of the metallic enclosure at frequency f1;
• a storage area located within the internal reading area of the metallic enclosure in the cart, the storage area configured to contain medical articles with associated data carriers identifying the medical articles, each data carrier being responsive to EM at frequency f1 but not operationally responsive to frequency f2, the storage area having an access control device that prevents access to the storage area when locked and allows access when unlocked;
• a receiving antenna disposed within the metallic enclosure and configured to receive the identification data provided by the data carriers in response to the injected EM;
• a processor;
• and
• a non-volatile memory in which is stored a patient data base containing identifications of all medical articles stored in the storage area for use by that patient, and a data base that links a health care provider to the patient;
• wherein the processor is programmed to unlock the storage area for access by a health care provider linked to the patient;
• and
• wherein after the storage area is re-locked, the processor is programmed to read all medical articles in the storage area to determine if any have been taken, if an article has been taken, the processor is programmed to compare the taken article to the patient data base and if the taken article is not found in the patient data base, to provide and alarm.