Modeling and analysis of mass casualty triage systems
Abstract
In the aftermath of a mass casualty incident, a large number of patients are likely to arrive at a hospital for medical care. The large patient demand often overwhelms the capacity of the medical resources available in an event called a patient surge, in which medical triage is often utilized. This study develops analytical models based on queuing theory that can be used as the basis for a tool to determine what staffing and other hospital resources are needed during a patient surge. Additionally, this study presents a simulation model that can also be utilized alongside the analytical models to analyze details that are not captured in the analytical approach. These models allow different patient volume and makeup scenarios to be evaluated so that the resources needed can be estimated. The models and codes developed in this study could be paired with a decision support system that hospital administrators and planners could use to develop contingency plans for mass casualty incidents with a variety of patient volumes and makeup. Finally, this study also made a small contribution to the queuing body of knowledge by extending results available for a Markovian multi-server priority queue to yield simple and reasonably accurate approximations for the general multi-server priority queue.
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- OSU Theses [15752]