IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/taf/thssxx/v1y2012i1p58-68.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Modelling emergency medical services with phase-type distributions

Author

Listed:
  • Vincent A Knight
  • Paul R Harper

Abstract

Effective and efficient emergency medical services (EMS) are a critical part of a national healthcare system. This paper describes research to model EMS by better capturing ambulance service times using Coxian phase-type (PH) distributions. Distributions are fitted to both the overall cycle time for different classes of patient priorities, as well as to sub-cycles. Sub-cycles are the distinct identifiable parts of the ambulance cycle time, such as travel times, time on scene and turnaround time at the hospital. The Coxian PH fits have then been used within a priority simulation model to provide guidance on the number of ambulances required to meet response time targets. Results from using various numbers of phases from the fitted Coxian distributions are compared. The proposed benefit of using sub-cycle fits is that it more readily permits scenario modelling within the simulation, such as evaluating the impact of reducing the turnaround time on the overall response times in the ambulance system.

Suggested Citation

  • Vincent A Knight & Paul R Harper, 2012. "Modelling emergency medical services with phase-type distributions," Health Systems, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 1(1), pages 58-68, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:taf:thssxx:v:1:y:2012:i:1:p:58-68
    DOI: 10.1057/hs.2012.1
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1057/hs.2012.1
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1057/hs.2012.1?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:taf:thssxx:v:1:y:2012:i:1:p:58-68. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Longhurst (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.tandfonline.com/thss .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.