Turbo Teddy: New Robot Revolutionizes Medication Delivery at St. Joseph's Children's Hospital in Tampa

St. Joseph’s Children’s Hospital in Tampa introduced a new staff member this week: a three-foot-tall robot named Turbo Teddy. This innovation addresses a critical challenge in medication delivery, ensuring children receive vital treatments more quickly.

Turbo Teddy transports specific medications, such as chemotherapy, GI, and neurological drugs, from the pharmacy to patients. These medications cannot be sent through the hospital’s pneumatic tube system because they cannot be shaken. Since starting operations this week, Turbo Teddy completes 10 to 20 deliveries daily.

Before Turbo Teddy, staff manually carried these sensitive medications from the pharmacy, located in the basement of St. Joseph’s Main Hospital, to the Children’s Day Hospital. To reduce the number of trips, staff often batched medications, which led to delays for patients. Danielle Nelski, a nurse manager at the Children’s Day Hospital, explained, “We had to have medications in batches so that the one person that was running those medications didn’t have to do that multiple times. So that would cause a delay sometimes in those medications getting to our patients.”

Now, Turbo Teddy makes single medication runs, which means quicker delivery times for children and frees up healthcare workers. Nelski added, “It allows the pharmacy staff to stay with the medications down in the pharmacy. And it allows nursing staff to stay in proximity with the patients instead of having to have somebody manually run back and forth several times throughout the day.”

The self-driving robot navigates secure doors, summons and rides elevators, and avoids people in hallways. The Fink family funded the robot through a donation and named it in honor of their Pomeranian. David Fink received care for Crohn’s disease at the hospital for over ten years.

The hospital treats Turbo Teddy as an official staff member, highlighting its integral role in improving patient care and operational efficiency.