WALL, N.J., Sept. 20, 2010 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- BIO-key International, Inc. (OTCBB:BKYI), a leader in finger-based biometric identification solutions for the healthcare industry, today announced that The Institute for Transfusion MedicineSM (ITxMSM), through its LifeSource and Central Blood Bank business units, is deploying BIO-key® TruDonor™ biometric identification technology. With TruDonor biometric identification, ITxM, the nation's third-largest independent blood center, will automate and reduce to seconds donor and patient registration while reducing data entry and duplicate donor errors and enhancing blood donor convenience and security.
"We are extremely excited about our partnership with BIO-key. We are transitioning to a paperless collections process, which will allow us to reduce costs and be more nimble in our interactions with donors and patients," said Eric Schulties, Vice President and Chief Information Officer of ITxM. "The technology provided by BIO-key brings us closer to our donors and patients, enabling us to spend more time interacting over their health and safety than trying to find and positively match a person to the right medical record. It was critical that BIO-key allows us to search for, not just positively identify, a person, so the registration experience is streamlined, simple, and more secure."
Schulties added, "Because checking identity is so easy with TruDonor, we are also planning to use fingerprint-enabled medical tablets to confirm identity at critical points in the collection, and potentially the transfusion process. Using BIO-key, we will not only raise the bar for blood safety, but also enhance the donor and patient experience, so that we can better serve our community and ensure a high quality blood supply to our hospital customers."
"ITxM is a recognized leader in the blood industry, and we are proud to add them to our prestigious list of BIO-key healthcare customers," said Jim Sullivan, BIO-key's Director of Sales. "TruDonor reduces the identification time to seconds without bar codes and virtually eliminates human errors during the registration process. A common theme among our customers is the need to meet the strict positive ID requirements of the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and European Union (EU) for blood donor identification. With BIO-key TruDonor identification in place, missing cards, similar names, name changes, and misspellings become non-issues."
About BIO-key
BIO-key International, Inc., headquartered in Wall, New Jersey, develops and delivers advanced identification solutions to commercial and government enterprises, integrators, and custom application developers. BIO-key's award winning, high performance, scalable, cost-effective and easy-to-deploy biometric finger identification technology accurately identifies and authenticates users of wireless and enterprise applications. Our solutions are used in local embedded OEM products as well as some of the world's largest identification deployments to improve security, guarantee identity, and help reduce identity theft. BIO-key's technology is offered directly or by market leading partners around the world. (http://www.bio-key.com)
About The Institute for Transfusion MedicineSM (ITxMSM)
The Institute for Transfusion MedicineSM (ITxMSM) is one of the nation's foremost organizations specializing in transfusion medicine and related services. Its Pittsburgh-based Central Blood Bank and Chicago-based LifeSource business units annually distribute nearly one million blood products to approximately 100 healthcare facilities in four states. Central Blood Bank services 40 area hospitals in western Pennsylvania, eastern Ohio, and northern West Virginia through its collections at more than 25 community donor centers and approximately 200 mobile blood drives a month. LifeSource services approximately 60 hospitals in Illinois through its collections at more than 20 donor centers and approximately 200 mobile blood drives a month.
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