Best Practices to Follow While Using Temperature Scanner in Public Places

Posted by Machine Sense on

Introduction

Ever since the governments eased the lockdown restrictions to revive the economy, people out-poured from their homes and started moving out in the open. Flights, railways, buses, restaurants, bars, clubs, schools, and several places are once again open to the public.

Amid such a crisis where people have to choose between life and livelihood, people are venturing out with risk at their hands. Companies that need employees on-premise are also open. People, by the hundreds, are back on the streets with masks and gloves, but the infection is still on the surge.

Making Use of Temperature Scanners

Isolating infected individuals with the help of a thermal scanner is the only intangible way to determine if a person is sick or not. Be it at your home, office, airport, and restaurant, thermal scanners are now indispensable.

The present trend of mass temperature scanners is by using an infrared thermometer, which ensures zero contact between two individuals. Authorities have deployed these thermometers in offices, malls, and other public places where they examine the visitors' temperature quickly.

But, for your information, they are not the most accurate way to detect temperature due to fever.

Why It Is Not the Best Technique

It is quite debatable whether a mass thermal scanner stationed at congested public places such as airports and railway stations are useful or not. Several reports and statistics have underlined how the detection of affected individuals using mass thermal scanners are not false proof.

The immediate questions are - why is it not enough? What could be different?

Thermal scanners and mass temperature scanners are contact less thermometers that work on the principle of infrared technology. They sense when the body temperature is elevated when the ray hits the skin of a person.

However, this reading of skin temperatures is not an estimate of what our body temperature is. If a person is working outdoors, under the Sun for some time, the temperature of the skin raises. For a generic thermal gun, this would signal that the person has a fever.

To get the best accuracy in estimating the correct body temperature and separate the infected individuals, one needs to be an expert hand at temperature detection and follow the best practices.

Forehead Scans - Would You Trust Them?

Our answer is - not cent percent. If that baffles you, we will explain to you the reason.

When can forehead thermal scans show incorrect reading? When the individual is under some stress, has come back from rigorous physical activity, or was smoking. A broader surface area such as the forehead can release heat with the release of tension and vice versa.

Since our body heat releases from our head, it becomes hotter and indicates a higher reading when we are doing some physical activity. Some scientific studies also claim that the presence of sweat interferes in detecting temperature using thermal scanners.

Using Wrists - A Better and Safer Temperature Scanning Practice

An alternative way to bypass misleading readings is to measure temperature from the wrists. The wrist is a smaller surface area, so there is reasonably less chance of incorrect readings. They do not experience any tension.

An infrared thermal scanner ejects an infrared beam that could be damaging to the skin cells of those people with sensitive skin. The laser beams used in these mass thermal scanners could lead to cancer on prolonged exposure. Therefore, to find out a better way to scan body temperature was all-important.

These days a shift of focus took place from the forehead to the wrists and elbows. Most doctors consider testing on a smaller surface area such as the wrist as a safer option.

Other Thermal Scanning Solutions

There are different devices available to track human body heat in public places. Using any of these devices is a recommended practice to keep the disease and the infected individual away.

  1. A handheld thermal gun thermometer, with a small LCD screen to show the temperature reading.
  2. A monitoring site that has a terminal with an LCD screen, and a thermal imaging camera.
  3. A thermal imaging camera paired with an NVR/PC.

Of these types of equipment, a handheld thermal gun is the most common and inexpensive thermal scanner. We can use it in public spaces as well as for personal use. and usually requires the subject to stand within a few feet for measurement.

Temperature monitoring stations are on premise thermal detection stations for public spaces. They are mostly used in low-traffic environments with single entrances, such as small to midsize office buildings, retail shops, and restaurants. The costs involved in setting up a temperature monitoring station is somewhere around $4,000 per station for a measurement distance of around six feet.

One big advantage of using these stations is that we can control and calibrate the interior ambient temperature and humidity. If that changes, the user must re-calibrate. This is a good practice and generates accurate results.

A high-efficient monitoring system with guaranteed precision is a thermal temperature monitoring imaging camera coupled with an NVR. It is an economical resolution for thermal scanning in medium to larger facilities such as schools, banks, colleges, offices, and department stores.

Thermal imaging cameras do not fail to detect body temperature in a crowded environment. What makes it undoubtedly the best practice to measure mass temperature is the way we can calibrate it to the interior environment. It enhances the accuracy of the readings.

Such a highly precise temperature measurement solution is expensive compared to other options. The complete setup and installation costs range from $15,000 to $20,000 per system. With such cameras, you can see a heat map on the screen. A wide-angle camera provides a detailed view and a further measurement distance.

Summarizing

Even with the best equipment at hand, one must always exercise the best practice to ensure the highest level of accuracy in temperature detection.

Ambient temperature in the checking area, absence of non-reflective surfaces, direct sunlight is essential for accurate results. The subject must not be covered with scarves and sunglasses as they may lead to erroneous results.

These best practices will guide everyone to a safer livelihood amidst the pandemic.