TEMPLE TERRACE, Fla. — While it sounds futuristic, robots are part of the now.
For industries like health care and emergency response, quality and efficiency are the top priority.
Those are just some reasons BayCare brought in 25 robots to the BayCare Integrated Service Center (BISC). The massive 258,000-square-foot distribution center holds supplies for 16 BayCare hospitals, numerous outpatient centers, doctor’s offices and more.
Supplies that are packed up by hand are now assisted by robots.
“That is like the whole point of this job. You finish (packing) one robot and you got to hurry up and find the nearest one,” said Priscilla Gracia, BISC distribution tech.
The robots were integrated into the picking areas of the service center. This is where the items for orders are hand selected, placed into gray tubs, and sent over to the packing/shipping area of the warehouse.
“Our inbound we are receiving all the stock, hundreds of pallets a day,” said Victor Celiberti, Director Supply Chain Services, BayCare Health Systems. “We get 500 small type packages a day we have to process. We put it all away in the morning, and then in the afternoon, we pick, pack and ship, using the latest technology, our Locus Robotics.”
When the robots were first mentioned, though, not everyone was on board. There was a general skepticism that comes with more change. People were worried about job loss.
“That was everybody’s thought — job security,” Gracia said. “Like, these robots are going to take over our jobs? Not knowing it still needs that human interaction. We are thinking it is robots that like got hands and grab stuff.”
Gracia laughs about it now, because it is very clear these robots would be pointless without a tech to actually pick and count the items needed in each order.
What makes the robots useful is they carry the selected items and travel without human help to where the next supply is located. Once launched, the 25 robots zoom up and down the aisles, quietly and quickly.
The efficiency of the picking area of the warehouse has nearly doubled since they arrived.
“This is way more organized, ya know. The robots hold all the weight. We don’t have to pick up the heavy tots and stuff,” Gracia said. “Then they just get sent back to induction. They take it off and put it on the carts, so this process is way more easier, as far as when it comes to heavy lifting on your back.”
The robots not only help the current staff but also help with a staffing problem.
“This has really helped us mitigate some of those labor shortages that we feel. And other industries and people around the area, and really around the country, are feeling nowadays. So it has really offset some of those labor shortages,” Celiberti said.
Distribution techs at the BISC assemble 12,000 orders a day. The supplies delivered out of the building are used to save lives every day.
