New neonatal patient ID band enhances SATO’s HealthCARE ID Solutions™ by reducing medical errors and improving patient safety

CHARLOTTE, NC – January 6, 2006 – SATO Corporation, a global leader in barcode printing, labeling, and EPC/RFID solutions, today announced the introduction of its latest patient identification solution for healthcare – its new, neonatal patient ID band, Neonatal Secure ID™.

Neonatal Secure ID™ provides a platform for point of care barcoding and further ensures the mother/child identification processes.  Points of administration include birthing wards, delivery rooms, maternity wards, neonatal intensive care units (NICU), and obstetric wards.

SATO’s HealthCARE ID Solutions offer healthcare providers a path to compliance using the latest in cost effective patient identification technology, SATO DuraMark thermal wristbands, CTMD thermal printers, and Label Gallery HC application software.   Label Gallery HC seamlessly interfaces to any hospital information system and allows the use of advanced identification technologies.

As with all of SATO’s DuraMark wristbands, the Neonatal Secure ID™ bands are latex free, virtually indestructible, patient comfortable, and easily read. 

According to Jamie Stallings, SATO America’s Healthcare Product Manager, “Neonatal positive identification is a relatively new application in comparison to adult, child, and infant identification. And even though the solution is new, it’s critically important to recognize that the mandates on patient safety, privacy, data security, and patient identification apply to this group of patients, too. Neonatal Secure ID™ is a comfortable, secure, and easily applied ID banding solution never before realized for neonates.”

About SATO
SATO is a pioneer in the Automatic Identification and Data Collection (AIDC) industry and the inventor of the world’s first electronic thermal transfer barcode printer. It revolutionized the barcoding industry by introducing the Data Collection System (DCS) & Labeling concept – a total barcode and labeling solution providing high quality barcode printers, scanners/hand held terminals, label design software and consumables. SATO is one of the first in the industry to introduce a complete, multi-protocol EPC-compliant, UHF RFID solution. 

SATO is publicly listed on the first section of Tokyo Stock Exchange in Japan. It has worldwide offices in the United States, Belgium, France, Germany, United Kingdom, Poland, Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand and China. For the fiscal year ended March 31, 2005, it reported revenues of US$575 million. For more information, contact SATO America at www.satoamerica.com <http://www.satoamerica.com/> .

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