Designed by clinicians, for clinicians, Smart Pods® are expandable, shipping container-based medical facilities that are robust, light weight, easily transportable, and rapidly deployable.

The units come equipped with application-specific medical equipment and are shipped as ISO standard 8’ x 20’ containers, which are manually expanded into approximately 400 square foot facilities during deployment. Smart features include:

• Scalable, Scientific, Spacious

  Expandable modular design optimized for personnel workflow and medical throughput, thus increasing productivity. Smart Pods can be connected together to become larger laboratory testing hubs, field hospitals or other multi-unit interconnected structures.

• Modular, Medical, Mobile

  Smart Pod facilities can be general clinics, isolation clinics, hospital wards, labs, pharmacies, operating rooms, and recovery modules. Smart Pods serve the critical dual purpose of enabling everyday community-based care and being rapidly relocated and redeployed for emergency use.

• Autonomous, Adaptable, Antimicrobial

  Multipurpose Smart Pods can be connected to utilities or operate off-grid. Infection control features include Needlepoint Bipolar Ionization (NPBI) technology, UV-HEPA and BIBO filtration systems, antiseptic and disinfectable surfaces, aluminum walls (allows bleaching), and option for negative-pressure isolation for airborne pathogens (SARS, TB, COVID).

• Rapid, Remote, Robust

  Fully equipped with laboratory equipment, medical furniture, or other application-specific medical equipment, Smart Pods are designed to be rapidly deployed and ready for use in remote, underserved and environmentally challenging areas.

• Telehealth, Treatment, Training

  Smart Pods are designed with wireless capability to enable integration with existing infrastructure, including tele-mentoring and tele-guidance by Baylor College of Medicine physician faculty to enhance knowledge dissemination and build workforce capacity in healthcare deserts.

Smart Pods designs are driven by the realities of clinical workflow challenges. The Smart Pod has been validated by doctors from Baylor College of Medicine, with the assistance of industrial engineers from NASA’s Johnson Space Center. Multiple units have been deployed and used on two continents. The first Smart Pods were successfully deployed in Monrovia, Liberia following the 2015 Ebola Epidemic, and current Smart Pod designs include a hospital ward, BSL-2 laboratory, BSL-3 laboratory, and pharmacy. Most recently, Smart Pod isolation clinics with advanced airflow systems for respiratory pathogens were deployed in Harris County, Texas in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.