A Multi-Objective Optimization Approach for Emergency Medical Service Facilities Location-Allocation in Rural Areas

Abstract

Purpose The location of emergency medical service (EMS) facilities is a basic facility location problem. Many scholars have examined this kind of problem, but research on the location of EMS facilities in rural areas is still lacking. Different from urban areas, the location optimization of EMS facilities in rural areas must consider the accessibility of roads. The objective of this study conducted the optimal locations of new EMS stations and construction/upgrading of transfer links aiming to improve the medical emergency efficiency of mountain rural areas. Methods Three multi-objective models were constructed to examine the effects of varying assumptions (suppose existing roads cannot be upgraded, existing roads can be upgraded, and existing roads can be upgraded and new roads can be constructed) about minimizing the population considered uncovered (response time from the residential to the EMS station less than or equal to 0.5 h), time spent traveling from the residential area to the EMS station, construction costs for building new emergency facilities, and costs for improving or building new roads. Furthermore, we developed an improved multi-objective simulated annealing algorithm to examine the problem of optimizing the design of rural EMS facilities. Results We tested the models and algorithm on the Miao Autonomous County of Songtao, Guizhou Province, China. According to the actual situation of the case area, the models and algorithm were tested with the assumption that only three new EMS stations would be constructed. The number of people not covered by EMS stations decreased from 30.7% in Model 1 to 22% in Model 2, and then to 18.9% in Model 3. Conclusion Our study showed that the traffic network had a significant impact on the location optimization of EMS stations in mountainous rural areas. Improving the traffic network conditions could effectively improve the medical emergency efficiency of mountain rural areas.

Proposta de um modelo de locação de poços tubulares para o atendimento à população afetada por secas

“…O problema de localização de facilidades pode ser aplicado nas mais diversas áreas de conhecimento. Lin et al (2018) o abordaram na logística reversa de veículos; Ghahremani-Nahr et al ( 2019) na cadeia de suprimentos de ciclo fechado; Mohammed & Wang (2017) em uma cadeia de suprimentos de carne baseada em RFID; Mogale et al (2018) na localização e alocação de silos de grãos; Wang et al (2018) e Chen & Lai (2022) o utilizaram para determinar a localização de instalações de saúde; Maharjan & Hanaoka (2020) e Mohammadi et al (2020) o fizeram na área delogística humanitária. Entretanto, a sua aplicação na locação de poços para exploração de águas subterrâneas ainda é pouco estudada.…”

A Robust Stochastic Programming Model for the Well Location Problem: The Case of The Brazilian Northeast Region

“…Facility location problems can be studied using different approaches, considering uncertainties or not, involving one or more objectives, and their applications cover a wide variety of fields. The authors of [42] addressed them in vehicle reverse logistics; [43] in the food sector; [44][45][46][47] in the closed-loop supply chain; [48,49] in an RFID-based meat supply chain; [50] in the location and allocation of grain silos; [41,51,52] in the location of healthcare facilities; and [53][54][55][56][57] in humanitarian logistics.…”