November the 2nd, 2020 – Four Croatian companies have designed a system that ”stops coronavirus” right at the entrance of wherever it is placed. From schools to dental clinics and many other facilities, this device is working to slow the spread of the new coronavirus.
As Jutarnji list/Matija Boltizar writes, at the very entrance to the Zagreb Dental Clinic lies a very special device. It measures the temperature of patients entering the building, checks whether they are wearing a mask and disinfects their hands and shoes, all without the assistance of any of the employees of the polyclinic. The same can be found in the Zagreb School of Economics and Management, as well as in the Zagreb Elementary School ”Ivan Cankar” and at the front door of about a hundred other institutions. Namely, it is a unique integrated system for the prevention of the spread of infections, abbreviated as IPS, behind which stand four Croatian companies that decided to give their contribution in the fight against the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus during the ongoing pandemic.
The idea for this innovative product was conceived by Krokoteks, a company from Sv. Ivana Zelina, which has been specialising in renting and washing hospital laundry and equipment for many years now, and the story of the development of this device starts at the beginning of the year when they introduced a new mat rental service.
”With the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic, standard mat rental services were no longer a complete solution that met the needs of users, which is why we turned to seeking an adequate solution for footwear disinfection. We found that very solution in a PVC mat in which a stainless steel tub is integrated, in which there is a disinfectant,” pointed out the director of Krokoteks, Hrvoje Mandic.
With this, he says, they solved the problem of disinfecting shoes, but there were still the necessary actions prescribed by the profession to deal with – hand disinfection, wearing protective masks and measuring body temperatures. At that time, Mandic pointed out, there was no effective product in Croatia that met all these requirements together, but all of them were individual and had insufficient quality solutions. So then, the idea arose to gather a set of partners and work together to create an IPS integrated system that would prevent the entry of the new virus into institutions and companies.
Let’s start now with the “analysis” of this unique Croatian solution. The housing of the device is produced by the company Promming from Cakovec, which has been manufacturing equipment for all types of shops and business premises for 30 years now. Their clients are large Croatian and foreign retail houses such as Mercator, Konzum, KTC, Tommy, Spar, E-plus, Migros and others. With the outbreak of the pandemic, many of their clients initially needed, due to epidemiological measures, to upgrade their cash registers with a protective partition made of Plexiglas. At Promming, they landed the task, and soon after that point, they noticed that there was a shortage and a growing demand for hygienic stations or dispensers for hand disinfection.
”During the lockdown, we dealt with almost 70 percent of production, because our warehouses were full due to the stopped export. We didn’t want to wait with folded arms until the borders reopened agaun, so in March we developed our own hygiene stations and disinfectant dispensers in just one week, which we put on the market over the next month,” explained Tomislav Kralj, the CEO of Promming.
Then, just a few months ago, they received an offer to develop a special series of pillars with Krokoteks that will also have a disinfectant mat. Here we now turn to the third Croatian company behind the production of IPS, and that is the Zagreb-based institution URIHO. Their collaboration with Krokoteks has been going on since back in spring, more specifically since they cut PVC mats that are integrated into stainless steel tubs, and then they only continued that work when the production of the first IPS devices began.
”Krokoteks supplies us with material and we cut, it isn’t a problem because it doesn’t take up too much time and space in the plant. Namely, we’re primarily engaged in the production of work protective clothing, and in the pandemic we dedicated part of our production to the production of cotton masks, so, in the last half a year, we’ve made more than a million masks,” said Goran Folnegovic, the assistant director of URIHO.
Krokoteks now had a housing and a mat with disinfectant, but they still lacked a component that would measure the user’s temperature. In order to eliminate the need for additional staff at the entrances to companies and institutions and to ensure the truly accurate measurement of body temperature, they decided to install a thermal camera of their own.
Here comes the last Croatian company that participates in the production of IPS, and it is AVT from Zagreb, a company that has found its niche in thermal cameras and audio systems for the police and the army. During the pandemic, they adjusted the operation of the camera and made one of the most accurate devices for the non-contact measurement of body temperature and the detection people not wearing masks. Their camera built into the IPS measures body temperature at 9,600 points on a human face at a distance of 1 metre, while IR sensors measure the temperature at one point with the device having to lean very close to the person’s forehead.
”Our thermal camera looks at the hottest spots on the face – the eyes, ears, neck, nose, and detects body temperatures by making up to four measurements in one single second. Another great advantage is that external conditions such as wind don’t reduce the accuracy of the data as much. Namely, we tested the laser pistol in severe outdoor conditions and found that the readings are accurate, with deviations of a mere two or three degrees,” explained Ivica Mijic,the director of Zagreb’s AVT.
So, thanks to Croatian companies, a combination of intelligence, IPS, a unique integrated system for preventing the spread of infections appeared on the market in just five short months. Even the Dr. Andrija Stampar Institute gave a recommendation for the use of IPS, stating that this device should be installed in kindergartens, schools and homes for the elderly. Krokoteks revealed that they have already installed about a hundred devices in various facilities.
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