Palmer Digital Group Develops Larger, Custom Temperature-Reading Display Stations

May 4, 2020 by Dave Haynes

Numerous vendors have in recent weeks been sending me news of their company’s addition of COVID-19 access control products, and almost all of them have looked like subtle variations on a standard design – a tablet-sized display/camera combo from China that sits on a pole, attaches to a wall or sits on a counter.

The idea is that access to a store or other business or facility is “gated” by this device, which scans for body temperature and permits access based on the scanned person having a normal reading.

All good, but it is reasonable to wonder in certain scenarios if the unit is big enough to be noticed and heeded. It can do fine for things like line-ups – like at passport control at an airport – but perhaps not in cases where the entry area is broad and people coming in are not channeled by rope lines.

So I was intrigued by Illinois-based Palmer Digital Group’s release of a health monitoring kiosk that is larger and quite different in terms of design. It is one of a handful of COVID-19 focused products the company has put out.

Says the company:

We have designed a floor mount and wall mount versions and they come with either a 32″ or 22″ display. This solutions has been tested and fully vetted and is ready to go! These kiosks are perfect for any application where employees our customers need to have their temperatures taking before entering a building.

The software plays advertising signage until the sensor identifies that someone is within range.

The software then asks the person to come within optimum range for temperature scanning while taking their temperature as they approach.

Once in range the controller queries the temp sensor / samples and sends the highest reading.

The software is able to do various diagnostic/analysis with the information:

• inform the person of their temperature;
• inform personnel in the vicinity of a suspected fever;
• collect the information / location / age-gender, and store for later retrieval.

There is every indication that this sort of thing will be part of the new norm for being out and about. The challenge, I think, will be coming up with the capex budget to buy in (though the cost of manual staffing with digital thermometers will exceed the cost of this in no time) and presenting a second use for the devices.

This virus will eventually burn out or a vaccine will be prevalent, and spending the money now to do this will be more easily rationalized for end-users if they know these devices could be re-purposed for other tasks, even as simple as marketing messages at a store entry.