Medication Round Automation: EUR 92,000 in Annual Relief

In inpatient care, significant time shares are spent on purely logistical activities. The medication round is one of the most time-consuming processes. Analyses in German care facilities show that automating this workflow enables annual cost relief of EUR 92,000 per location. This sum results primarily from the reduction of travel times that highly qualified specialist staff previously had to spend transporting carts between pharmacy, storage, and ward.

An essential factor is the decoupling of logistics and care services. When the robot takes over transport, up to 45 minutes of pure travel time per floor per shift are eliminated. In a facility with four living areas, this adds up to three hours per shift. Extrapolated over the year and taking current wage costs for nursing specialists into account, the verified value of EUR 92,000 emerges. werob enables this outcome through a model where you only pay when the robot is productively in use. There are no list prices or high upfront investments, but purely results-oriented compensation.

The biggest hurdle in introducing robotics in care is often the lengthy planning phase. Classical consulting approaches need three to six months to define requirements. werob shortens this process through the Spec Engine to 48 hours. This AI-supported platform has been trained on the basis of over 35,000 projects and translates your operational workflows directly into a ready-to-deploy robot specification.

You only describe the shift schedule, the structural conditions, and the type of task. The Spec Engine creates a precise requirements profile from this, taking into account both technical parameters and regulatory necessities. This automated workflow ensures that no details are overlooked in the infrastructure or interfaces. While the competition is still creating discovery decks, werob already delivers the technical basis for rollout after two days. This is the first step of the promise: 48 hours to spec, 5 days to offer, 8 weeks to the robot in use.

werob is not a manufacturer and not an exclusive reseller of individual brands. We are the systems integrator that filters the market for you. Our catalog contains over 44 OEM partners with more than 280 different robot models. For the medication round, we rank this hardware against your specific requirements. Whether a compact Keenon T9 for narrow corridors or a more robust transport robot for heavy loads is the best choice is decided solely by suitability for your workflow.

This hardware agnosticism protects you from vendor lock-in. Should a manufacturer change its strategy or a new, more efficient model come onto the market, the werob platform allows seamless switching or expansion of the fleet. We evaluate the robots according to criteria such as battery life, navigation precision in dynamic environments, and cleanability according to HACCP standards. Humanoid systems, such as those already successfully tested in a Hamburg care facility in the twelfth week of operation, are also part of our portfolio for future expansion stages of automation.

A robot working in isolation from care documentation creates additional effort instead of relief. Therefore, werob delivers pre-built connectors into the existing operator stack. Our platform integrates directly into systems such as PointClickCare and MatrixCare. As soon as the medication round is prepared in the system, the robot automatically receives the order and the destination coordinates of the respective ward.

This deep integration ensures that the data flow is bidirectional. The status of transport is reported back to the care dashboard in real time. Specialists see immediately when the cart arrives on their floor. This connectivity is a core differentiator of werob. We do not build individual bridge solutions, but use standardized interfaces that enable rapid rollout. The error rate in cart assignment is minimized, as the assignment is system-side and does not have to be entered manually on the robot.

The use of robots in environments with people is subject to strict regulatory requirements. Particularly critical is the new EU Machinery Regulation 2023/1230, which becomes binding for all operators from 20 January 2027. werob acts as your compliance path here. We ensure that all deployed systems undergo the necessary conformity assessments and meet the requirements for safety in public spaces.

In addition, we consider specific standards such as ISO 13482 for service robots for personal care. In Germany, coordination with home supervision is also decisive. werob has experience from over 200 live systems in 11 European countries to accelerate these approval processes. Our Cockpit monitors the fleet not only technically, but also regulatorily. Every movement and every system state is logged in an audit-proof manner, which represents a decisive advantage in audits or inspections by supervisory authorities. We take responsibility for compliance with the GDPR and cybersecurity standards according to IEC 62443.

Once the robots are in use, the werob Cockpit takes over central control. It is a four-dimensional traffic light system that monitors hardware, infrastructure, regulation, and adherence to specification. For the care management, this means maximum transparency without technical effort. If a robot stops due to an obstacle or needs maintenance, this is proactively reported before it disrupts operations.

The Cockpit also enables central management of multiple locations. Large providers such as Korian Germany use this overview to compare the performance of their fleets and scale best practices across locations. The data from the Cockpit prove the actual relief: we measure exactly how many kilometers the staff has saved through the use of robotics. This transparency is the basis for our outcome-only model. You see in black and white the value that automation generates daily for your facility.

The path to the automated medication round at werob follows a strict eight-step process. After the initial capture of your requirements via the Spec Engine, a binding offer follows within five days. Once the decision has been made, the eight-week implementation phase begins. This includes mapping the premises, integration into the software stack, and training employees on site.

A critical success factor is acceptance by the team. We frame robotics not as a replacement for care workers, but as a tool to free them from non-specialist tasks. In practice, enthusiasm increases as soon as the first night shift has been completed without heavy carts and long walks. Through the short implementation cycles of just eight weeks, facilities very quickly reach the point of interest where monthly relief exceeds operating costs. werob accompanies this process as a partner that takes over the entire complexity of systems integration.

Automating the medication round is often just the start. The werob platform is designed to grow with your requirements. Once the infrastructure for the first transport robot is in place, further use cases such as laundry transport (EUR 71,000 relief) or cleaning of common areas can be seamlessly added. Since all systems are controlled via the same Cockpit, administrative effort remains minimal.

With the goal of having over 2,000 robots in live operation by 2028, werob continuously invests in expanding the connectors and refining the Spec Engine. We observe the market for humanoid robots very closely and integrate them as soon as they reach the necessary maturity for the tough daily care routine. For operators, the partnership with werob means that they always stay at the forefront technologically, without having to commit to a single hardware manufacturer. You invest in a process and a result, not in a single device.