An intelligent hybrid agent for medical emergency vehicles navigation in urban spaces

Abstract

This paper presents a decision support system integrated in a GIS with the aim of managing optimal navigation of emergency medical vehicles in urban areas. The focus is particularly on individuation of the shortest route for ambulance facilities. We do not simply propose a solution to the calculation of the shortest route in the traditional terms of distance to be traveled but rather the individuation of a route bearing in mind the set of factors that can cause delayed ambulance response. For this purpose, an expert system is integrated with the traditional algorithms for calculating the shortest route (such as Dijkstra's algorithm). To build the expert system, a set of rules is deduced from observation of the behavior of ambulance drivers, and a model of the urban road network is built in order to apply the algorithm calculating the shortest route. We thus aim to provide a decision support tool that can maximize emergency service vehicle response, an evidently critical factor with a life or death impact. Finally, we stress the theoretical and practical difficulties of interaction among two such different tools as the expert system and a mathematical method calculating the shortest route. © 2005 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.