Emergency response team (ERT) member characteristics that contribute to High Reliability performance during patient care resuscitation events or other Critical Incident Management Situations are poorly understood. Findings from this study describe individual characteristics that experienced interprofessional ERT members perceive as contributing to High Reliability performance within the critical incident management context. This study supports the need for interprofessional research about emergency response teams’ High Reliability in hospital-based settings. ERT High Reliability, or “better than expected” team performance has been linked to overall patient care and safety. The purpose of this study was to identify and describe individual team member characteristics that contribute to High Reliability performance of ERT members and the overall emergency response team in a naturalistic setting during Critical Incident Management Situations. Using a qualitative descriptive design, data collection included participant observations, field notes, and interviews. Narrative data were audio-taped, transcribed and coded using Ethnograph v6©. Data content were analyzed thematically using inductive interpretive methods. Two major domains derived from the data were Self-Regulation and Whole-Team Regulation. The overarching theme, Orchestrating High Reliability at the Edge of Chaos, encompassed characteristics contributing to High Reliability performance of the ERT during Critical Incident Management Situations.

The UAE is an Islamic state which has undergone dramatic urbanisation in the last 30 years. It is situated near the eastern margin of the Arabian tectonic plate, close to the seismically active collision zone between the Arabian and Eurasian plates, marked by the Zagros Mountain belt of Iran. In the UAE the population of Dibba in Fujairah has felt tremors as recently as November 26 2009 and an earthquake with a magnitude (M) of 5 occurred in Masafi, Fujairah, in March 2002. The most recent earthquake was M 4.3, and awareness of seismic hazard is increasing. In addition to earthquakes, rapid heavy rainfall in the arid environment of the UAE typically results in high level of discharge and flooding. Tropical storms have also struck the Indian Ocean coast of the UAE and have caused damage in coastal areas. The impact of natural hazard events in Fujairah since 1995 and the responses of the authorities and affected communities illustrates the issues faced by the country and is discussed in this thesis. The Federal Plan to face disasters in the UAE prepared by the Civil Defence sets out the role of the government structures in the UAE to manage disasters with particular reference to the Ministry of Interior, which is the responsible body. A survey of UAE ministries and the Civil Defence shows that in practice there is a lack of clarity between the roles of government bodies and there are many areas of confusion regarding jurisdiction and responsibility between the federal and individual emirate institutions. It was a concern that some supporting ministries were unaware of their role as set out in the overall plan. There is lack of evidence of an integrated approach and no testing of effectiveness of emergency procedures through simulation exercises. It is recognised that, not only are school children particularly vulnerable to natural disasters but also that education is an important mitigation tool through raising awareness of hazard exposure amongst the population. A survey of schools in Fujairah showed that there was little preparation for natural disasters and no framework to address this issue or to ensure the structural integrity of school buildings. The survey revealed that there is a willingness to learn among the school children and this was followed up by a pilot scheme to raise awareness. This is important as the survey also revealed that traditional views about losses are still common amongst parents, particularly in rural areas. The vulnerability of the communities to natural hazards is strongly influenced by social and cultural factors. A survey was undertaken of the population of the UAE to investigate their awareness of natural hazards, their perception of risk and how this might be mitigated. The survey revealed a low level awareness and what the role of government agencies would be in the event of a disaster. A majority considered that disasters were Acts of God, a punishment, and that the most effective way to mitigate risk was through religious observance. It is clear that even in a developed Islamic country an effective response to mitigate risk needs to recognise and address the cultural and religious contexts. Finally the thesis evaluates the response capability of the UAE to the impact of natural hazards. This analysis shows that though there is a Federal Plan for Disasters there is little specific focus on natural hazards. Ministries not directly involved with the Civil Defence were sometimes unclear regarding their roles. At an operational level there is lack of clarity regarding responsibilities and lines of authority between different bodies and between Federal and emirate structures. The Civil Defence was very much focussed on response with little effort devoted to reducing vulnerability through awareness-raising, hazard assessment and monitoring. These need to be addressed to minimise the risk from natural disasters.

This thesis is concerned with the problem of processing data from Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) to meet the requirements of emergency responders (e.g. Fire and Rescue Services). A WSN typically consists of spatially distributed sensor nodes to cooperatively monitor the physical or environmental conditions. Sensor data about the physical or environmental conditions can then be used as part of the input to predict, detect, and monitor emergencies. Although WSNs have demonstrated their great potential in facilitating Emergency Response, sensor data cannot be interpreted directly due to its large volume, noise, and redundancy. In addition, emergency responders are not interested in raw data, they are interested in the meaning it conveys. This thesis presents research on processing and combining data from multiple types of sensors, and combining sensor data with other relevant data, for the purpose of obtaining data of greater quality and information of greater relevance to emergency responders. The current theory and practice in Emergency Response and the existing technology aids were reviewed to identify the requirements from both application and technology perspectives (Chapter 2). The detailed process of information extraction from sensor data and sensor data fusion techniques were reviewed to identify what constitutes suitable sensor data fusion techniques and challenges presented in sensor data processing (Chapter 3). A study of Incident Commanders' requirements utilised a goal-driven task analysis method to identify gaps in current means of obtaining relevant information during response to fire emergencies and a list of opportunities for WSN technology to fill those gaps (Chapter 4). A high-level Emergency Information Management System Architecture was proposed, including the main components that are needed, the interaction between components, and system function specification at different incident stages (Chapter 5). A set of state-awareness rules was proposed, and integrated with Kalman Filter to improve the performance of filtering. The proposed data pre-processing approach achieved both improved outlier removal and quick detection of real events (Chapter 6). A data storage mechanism was proposed to support timely response to queries regardless of the increase in volume of data (Chapter 7). What can be considered as “meaning” (e.g. events) for emergency responders were identified and a generic emergency event detection model was proposed to identify patterns presenting in sensor data and associate patterns with events (Chapter 8). In conclusion, the added benefits that the technical work can provide to the current Emergency Response is discussed and specific contributions and future work are highlighted (Chapter 9).

Master of Science / Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering / Jessica L. Heier Stamm / During public health emergencies, organizations in charge require an immediate and e ffcient method of distributing supplies over a large scale area. Due to the uncertainty of where individuals will choose to receive supplies, these distribution strategies have to account for the unknown demand at each facility. Current techniques rely on population ratios or requests by health care providers. This can lead to an increased disparity in individuals' access to the medical supplies. This research proposes a mathematical programming model, along with a solution methodology to inform distribution system planning for public health emergency response. The problem is motivated by distribution planning for pandemic influenza vaccines or countermeasures. The model uses an individual choice constraint to determine what facility the individual will choose to receive their supplies. This model also determines where to allocate supplies in order to meet the demand of each facility. The model was solved using a decomposition method. This method allows large problems to be solved quickly without losing equity in the solution. In the absence of publicly-available data on actual distribution plans from previous pandemic response e fforts, the method is applied to another representative data set. A computational study of the equity and number of people served depict how the model performed compared to the actual data. The results show that implementing an individual choice constraint will improve the effectiveness of a public health emergency response campaign without losing equity. The thesis provides several contributions to prior research. The first contribution is an optimization model that implements individual choice in a constraint. This determines where individuals will choose to receive their supplies so improved decisions can be made about where to allocate the resources. Another contribution provided is a solution methodology to solve large problems using a decomposition method. This provides a faster response to the public health emergency by splitting the problem into smaller subproblems. This research also provides a computational study using a large data set and the impact of using a model that accounts for individual choice in a distribution campaign.

Master of Agribusiness / Department of Agricultural Economics / Vincent Amanor-Boadu / The overall objective of this research is to develop a business continuity plan for a relatively large livestock company located in Francophone West Africa. This is very important in an environment when both internal and external risks can lead to significant disruptions in the business processes. The research, thus, focuses on developing a process that can be applied to establish a business continuity management process in this firm and provides the framework for implementing such a plan successfully. The livestock company, let us call it Livestock Co. to protect its identity, wants to define strategies for recovery, resumption of business and other key activities under the potential scenarios. Its managers desire to formulate crisis response strategies that would be implemented quickly when these disasters hit. The thesis envisages the potential conditions that may trigger these crises and develops the management systems to mitigate them, returning the business to it activities as quickly as possible. Some of the natural disasters that may be considered are fire, accidents and political upheavals. Some technical disasters that may be imagined may be related to infrastructure, labor crisis, and grain dust explosions. Unlike natural disasters, which often are uncertain, technical disasters can be predicted based on careful assessment of the environment or the assets. The research evaluates the process for developing a business continuity management plan and offers an implementation process to ensure its smooth execution.

Emergency response times have been shown to be directly correlated with mortality rates of out-of-hospital patients. Studies have been conducted to show the relationship between time and mortality rates until patients receive the proper treatment. With more cardiac arrests and other life threatening illnesses occurring in the United States, more emergency calls will be required as well. As of today, technological advancements have been made to reduce response times, but human factors still require certain procedures, causing delays in the run time and increasing the rate of mortality. Here we show the results of emergency response times with the market penetration of connected and autonomous vehicles. With connected and autonomous vehicles, the average time emergency vehicles spend on the roadways can be significantly decreased. Safety procedures with human drivers can be eliminated, giving the emergency vehicle a proper right-of-way through virtual emergency lanes and removing the need to slow down and avoid vehicles at intersections or during periods of heavy congestion. Our results show a three minute decrease in response time under full market penetration of the technology, reducing the mortality rate and increasing the potential to save lives.

The optimal allocation of the resources to the emergency locations in the event of multiple crises in an urban environment is an intricate problem, especially when the available resources are limited. In such a scenario, it is important to allocate emergency response units in a fair manner based on the criticality of the crisis events and their requests. In this research, a crisis management tool is developed which incorporates a resource allocation algorithm. The problem is formulated as a game theoretic framework in which the crisis events are modeled as the players, the emergency response centers as the resource locations with emergency units to be scheduled and the possible allocations as strategies. The pay-off is modeled as a function of the criticality of the event and the anticipated response times. The game is played assuming a specific region within a certain locality of the crisis event to derive an optimal allocation. If a solution is not feasible, the perimeter of the locality in consideration is increased and the game is repeated until convergence. Experimental results are presented to illustrate the efficacy of the proposed methodology and metrics are derived to quantify the fairness of the solution. A regression analysis has been performed to identify the statistical significance of the results.

<p>After emergencies involving chemical spills it is of great importance that correct measures are taken with short notice, both for the security of people and in order to minimize future environmental consequences. The RIB-unit at the Swedish Rescue Services Agency initiated this study, the aim of which is to propose changes to the existing chemical transport calculation tool: Chemical Spill 3.4, included in RIB - Integrated Decision Support for Civil Protection, so that it can be used for decision support as well as in preventive work. A rough estimation of chemical transport in the subsurface is considered being of great importance when making decisions during emergency response operations.</p><p>The proposition presented in this report is a non site specific chemical transport model which is designed to give a rough estimation of NAPL flow in homogenous isotropic soil shortly after an instantaneous release. The model can be used at two levels; both in situations without access to information on subsurface properties, and with more accuracy in situations with knowledge of the included parameters. For that reason the user can choose among predefined alternatives or assign the parameters a numeric value to increase the quality of the model output. The predefined alternatives are represented by default values for different parameters in the model.</p><p>Suggested model output are vertical and horizontal transport of NAPL phase, horizontal transport of dissolved chemical in the aqueous phase, as well as the amounts of spill that are evaporated and entrapped in the soil, all at the time specified by the user. Moreover the maximum transport of the chemical phase and time to groundwater pollution are given. To make the uncertainty of the model clear for the user the results are given as the most likely value together with the smallest and largest values that can be expected.</p><p>Equations presented in this report describe a selection of subsurface processes which occur after a release of chemicals. The selection is made with the aim to reach satisfying result when the model is used within its domain without making the model complicated for the user. Therefore simplifying assumptions have been made in the descriptions of some processes while some other processes are neglected. Simplifications have been based on recognized references or on theoretical arguments, but the overall performance of the model as well as some of the default input parameters need to be further tested and validated before the new version of the model can be included in RIB. However, compared with the existing version Chemical Spill 3.4 several changes have been suggested; including additional processes, development of default values and making model uncertainty clear to the user. These changes are thought to significantly improve the existing model.</p> / <p>Vid olyckor med kemikalieutsläpp är det av stor vikt att rätt åtgärder snabbt vidtas, både för människors säkerhet och för att minimera framtida miljökonsekvenser. Räddningsverkets RIB-enhet initierade den här studien vars mål är att ge förslag på modellteknisk förbättring av det befintliga beräkningsprogrammet Kemspill Mark 3.4, som ingår i programpaketet RIB - Integrerat beslutsstöd för skydd mot olyckor, så att det i framtiden kan användas som beslutsstöd vid räddningsinsats efter kemikalieutsläpp samt vid förebyggande planeringsarbete. En grov vägledning om kemikaliens spridning anses vara av stor betydelse för att räddningstjänsten ska kunna fatta rätt beslut vid en insats.</p><p>Förslaget som presenteras i denna rapport är en icke platsspecifik spridningsmodell anpassad för vätskor med begränsad löslighet i vatten och ger en grov uppskattning av spridning i homogen och isotrop mark inom några timmar efter ett momentant utsläpp.</p><p>Modellen ska kunna användas på två nivåer; för att ge en mycket grov uppskattning av spridningen även utan tillgång på uppgifter om markegenskaper, samt med större noggrannhet då informationen finns. Med anledning av detta kommer användaren ges möjlighet att välja bland fördefinierade alternativ eller att ange indata numeriskt för att öka noggrannheten. De fördefinierade valen representeras av typvärden för olika parametrar i modellen.</p><p>Den nya modellen i förslaget ger vid angiven tid vertikal och horisontell spridning av fri kemikaliefas, horisontell spridning av löst förorening i vattenfas samt hur stor andel av utsläppet som hålls kvar i marken respektive har avdunstat från spillytan. Dessutom anges kemikaliefasens maximala spridning och hur lång tid det tar för utsläppet att nå grundvattnet. För att tydliggöra modellens osäkerhet för användaren ges utdata som det mest sannolika värdet tillsammans med det största och minsta värdet som är sannolikt.</p><p>Ekvationerna som presenteras i rapporten beskriver ett urval av de processer som sker i marken vid ett kemikalieutsläpp. Urvalet har gjorts med utgångspunkt att uppnå tillfredställande resultat inom modellens domän utan att komplicera för användaren och därmed har förenklande antaganden gjorts för att beskriva vissa förlopp medan andra försummats helt. Förenklingarna har grundats på vedertagna referenser eller på teoretiskt resonemang. Validering av modellresultat samt vissa typvärdens intervall krävs före inkludering i RIB. Jämfört med det befintliga Kemspill Mark 3.4 har dock stora förändringar föreslagits; fler processer inkluderas, typvärden utvecklas och modellens osäkerhet görs tydlig för användaren. Förändringar tros medföra en signifikant förbättring av modellen.</p>

Fire emergency responders work in teams where they must communicate and coordinate to save lives and property, yet contemporary emergency response training expends few resources teaching team coordination. The present research investigates re emergency response team coordination practice to develop a zero- delity simulation game to teach team coordination skills. It begins with an ethnographic investigation of re emergency response work practice, develops the concept of nonmimetic simulation with games, iterates game designs, then evaluates game designs with non- re emergency responders and re emergency response students. The present research de nes a new type of simulation, non-mimetic simulation: an operational environment in which participants exercise skills without a re-creation of the concrete environment. In traditional simulation, the goal is to re-create the world as faithfully as possible, as this has clear value for teaching skills. Non-mimetic simulations capture abstract, human-centered aspects of a work environment from a grounding in practice. They provide an alternative, economical, focused environment in which to exercise skills. Constructed as games, they can provide intrinsic and extrinsic motivation to practice and learn. The present work iterates a series of game designs in which players transform and share information with each other while under stress, engaging in processes of team coordination found in re emergency response work practice. We demonstrate how the game successfully teaches participants how to become more e ective at coordinating and communicating through user studies with non- re emergency responders and re emergency response students. Principles for the design of team coordination education, non-mimetic simulation, and cooperative game play are developed.

none