By Dan Hounsell, Senior Editor, Facility Market

Drones have quickly evolved from hobbyist equipment to crucial components in an array of applications, including institutional and commercial buildings. For example, facility managers are increasingly turning to drones to conduct inspections of large roofs and inaccessible areas of facilities. Now their use is expanding to streamline the flow of medicines and materials in healthcare facilities.

Hutchinson Regional Medical Center will be the first test site in the United States for a new drone-based delivery network of healthcare resources, such as medicines and lab samples, according to GovTech. German drone manufacturer Wingcopter and Denver-based air medical service provider Air Methods recently announced their partnership.

Hutchison was chosen because of a prior relationship with the companies in the air medical business. The companies were looking for a test site that met all the criteria. Those criteria included wide open spaces and a relationship with surrounding hospitals and laboratories for items to be flown between. Hospital grounds do not feature many overhanging structures or obstacles in flight paths.

Initially, flights will be just demonstrations for the Federal Aviation Administration, to qualify the agencies to perform flights unguided by a pilot. The drone will use GPS and cell towers essentially to fly themselves with onboard instruments.

The drones have a range of up to 68 miles with a maximum speed of 90 mph and payloads of up to 13 pounds. Possible uses include delivering blood, medicines, and small medical devices to surrounding areas or transporting vaccines more quickly and efficiently.

Wingcopter's delivery drones use tilt-rotor technology, similar to the military Osprey, which facilitates vertical take-off and landing like a helicopter, with forward flight like a plane.