>> Interesting. I recently had to visit my ailing grandmother in the
>> ntensive care unit of a local hospital. No warnings about cell phones
>> and in fact saw staff use them.
>> So I'd say yes, we can use our cell phones in hospitals.
> It varies. One hospital where I spent a lot of time a few years ago
> (as a visitor, not a patient) banned all cell phone use anywhere in
> the building. I got in trouble on my first visit. There was a big
This issue started because of the power generated by the old original brick phones and later the analog phones. Now the digital phones general very small power signals by design and rarely interfere with medical gear or anything else. Which is why hospitals might ban outside cell phones (they don't want to run a power check) but have an in house network of new digital phones that don't put out enough power to worry about. I'm sure there's a set of standards these days dealing with this area of "hospital gear certified to work around cell phones certified to be below power levels of xxx".