Ruggedized Medic

The Army Medical Department has a need for a small, ruggedized personal digital assistant (PDA) personal computer (PC) for use in combat casualty case and field health services support operations. This device must meet the requirements of existing andemerging software applications for field medical first responder use by providing the capability to run application programs written for both the Palm computer operating system (PALM OS) and the Windows CE operating system (Win CE OS) in a single, ruggedcomputer. This capability will permit the military medical community to use government and commercially developed medical application software on the PDA, avoiding significant development costs to the military in acquisition and maintenance of medicalsoftware. In addition to the dual operating system capability, the Ruggedized Medic PDA must also contain an interface suitable for use in battlefield conditions to read data from medical Personnel Identification Carrier (PIC) devices as well as includeadditional expansion capabilities to enhance the PDA for use in other military and industrial applications.Paravant expects a significant commercial market to exist for this effort both with the DOD and in the private sector marketplace. Within the DOD,it is noted that there are close to ten thousand US Army first responder medics that could utilize this advanced technology t better perform their jobs of saving and prolonging life until primary care can be reached. The Marines and Special Forces medicsare an additional market able to benefit, add several thousand more possible systems. The same need exists within the private sector. Harsh environmental conditions require a first responder computer system to meet many of the same environmentalrequirements as for military use. This market is estimated to be much larger than the DOD market . Paravant expects to utilize distribution channels and Representative Organization within the Public Health and Safety community to serve this market place.In summary, there is a tremendous unfilled need in both the DOD and Private Sector markets for such a device, and Paravant is well positioned to successfully serve both.