This is my first time participating in a hackathon, which was held from 18-19 July 2014. With this year’s theme “Smart Living – Using Data to Enrich Communities”, we have to come up with solutions to solve various challenges using Arduino Uno or Raspberry Pi within 24 hour. My team (Biao Yi & I) decided to use an Arduino Uno to solve the set of challenges given to us.
What did we decide to do?
After much brainstorming, we decided to create a device that dispenses medicine prescriptions when a receipt is scanned.This device would be as big as a vending machine and will be available around polyclinics and hospitals. We felt that with this device, we need not spent too much time waiting to get their prescription as there will be multiple of this “machine”. Furthermore, this machine will be linked to a medical cloud system across the country, so that you can pick up your prescription at the nearest clinic/ hospital.
How would the patients get their prescription? Well, they will insert a special QR code & RF reciept into the machine, and then enter their IC number. The screen will then show them their prescriptions that will be dispensed, and they must press the “confirm” button before the prescription will be dispense. After the medicine is being dispensed, a reciept will be printed out with the instructions/ dosage for each medicine.
We then made a small prototype that dispenses medicine prescriptions using servo (at the back) when a color-coded receipt is scanned at the scanner. The LED there will change color according to what type of medicine that will be dispensed.
Through this hackathon, we gained inspiration from other’s idea, and valuable experience from it. Overall, I felt that this hackathon made us stretched our creativity to innovate.
