Feh & Other notions

Well, Dad had his tracheotomy today, and I'm told he came out of it reasonably well. Still a bit logey when Mom left for the day, but well.

I won't be seeing him for a couple of days...I've been staying away because I thought I *might* be coming down with something, but I'm increasingly certain that as my chest and sinuses intermittently turn to slime that staying away from the ICU is a favor to everyone on the floor.

Hopefully things will continue to improve for Dad, and I'm exploring the nature of some assistive technology. The way it works is that someone with vocal difficulties types a word or phrase into a computer, and the computer then blats forth in a depressingly artificial (yet understandable) voice the typed phrase. Mom tells me Dad is excited by this notion, but I am still exploring the tech - given that he's in isolation (due to the MRSA issues) I *really* want to know if:

a) A computer I place in that environment should be *disposable* (i.e., once it goes in, it can never come out). This will affect my choice of hardware, at the very least.

b) The EMI issue - will a *normal* PC tossed into a medical environment interfere with monitoring equipment? Granted, the in-room PC that the staff use for medical record-keeping appears a fairly standard beast...but for all I know, once you pop the top it could have all sorts of funky shielded cabling and boards and oddness. Experimentation does not seem an appropriate practice in this environment.

I suspect I'll need, given that Mom is distinctly non-tech, to have a little chat with the Rehab folk and the hospital folk - I'm also told that many hospitals maintain an "assistive technology library" under one organizational title or another....something to look into, though remotely for the moment...