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Dr. Daniel Aiham Ghazali

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1. Emergency Department, EMS, and Department of Research in Emergency Medicine and Simulation, University Hospital of Amiens and University Jules Vernes, 80000 Amiens, France
2. IAME Research Unit "Infection, Antimicrobials, Modelling, Evolution", INSERM UMR1137, University of Paris, 75018 Paris, France
Interests: simulation and medical pedagogy for technical and non-technical skills improvement; crisis resource management, teamwork, and leadership; stress and performance relationships during life-threatening events management; environmental impact on ED activities and management
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Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The COVID-19 pandemic has had a lasting impact on the global healthcare system, forcing countries around the world to adapt their healthcare systems. This situation may be expected to continue over time. We would like to prepare a Special Edition on “Emergency Preparedness for Healthcare in Pandemic”. Sharing experiences allows for faster improvement of adaptation processes in the face of future pandemics. This edition aims to describe the strategies implemented in hospitals to cope with the lack of resuscitation beds, to accommodate the increased flow of patients in the emergency departments and the reorganization of wards.

These strategies can be managerial (reorganization of administrative and care services, reorganization of human resources, etc.), technological (telemedicine, connected health, etc.), or therapeutic (impact on the care of COVID-19 and COVID-19 free patients). A special place is dedicated to anticipation strategies of future pandemics. These strategies are based, for example, on emergency health plans, the preparation of caregivers in the face of an exceptional situation, but also on artificial intelligence to anticipate future crises and organize care in a health crisis.

Dr. Daniel Aiham Ghazali
Guest Editor

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Keywords

pandemic
healthcare system
emergency preparedness
health crisis
management
new technologies
artificial intelligence

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

13 pages, 3557 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Use of Artificial Intelligence to Manage Patient Flow in Emergency Department during the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Prospective, Single-Center Study

by Emilien Arnaud, Mahmoud Elbattah, Christine Ammirati, Gilles Dequen and Daniel Aiham Ghazali

Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(15), 9667; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19159667 - 05 Aug 2022

Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1873

Abstract

Background: During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, calculation of the number of emergency department (ED) beds required for patients with vs. without suspected COVID-19 represented a real public health problem. In France, Amiens Picardy University Hospital (APUH) developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) project called “Prediction of the Patient Pathway in the Emergency Department” (3P-U) to predict patient outcomes. Materials: Using the 3P-U model, we performed a prospective, single-center study of patients attending APUH’s ED in 2020 and 2021. The objective was to determine the minimum and maximum numbers of beds required in real-time, according to the 3P-U model. Results A total of 105,457 patients were included. The area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC) for the 3P-U was 0.82 for all of the patients and 0.90 for the unambiguous cases. Specifically, 38,353 (36.4%) patients were flagged as “likely to be discharged”, 18,815 (17.8%) were flagged as “likely to be admitted”, and 48,297 (45.8%) patients could not be flagged. Based on the predicted minimum number of beds (for unambiguous cases only) and the maximum number of beds (all patients), the hospital management coordinated the conversion of wards into dedicated COVID-19 units. Discussion and conclusions: The 3P-U model’s AUROC is in the middle of range reported in the literature for similar classifiers. By considering the range of required bed numbers, the waste of resources (e.g., time and beds) could be reduced. The study concludes that the application of AI could help considerably improve the management of hospital resources during global pandemics, such as COVID-19. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emergency Preparedness for Healthcare in Pandemic)

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11 pages, 323 KiB

Open AccessArticle

Emergency Preparedness for the COVID-19 Pandemic: Social Determinants Predicting the Community Pharmacists’ Preparedness and Perceived Response in Malaysia

by Tan Yu Xin, Kingston Rajiah and Mari Kannan Maharajan

Int. J. Environ. Res. Public Health 2022, 19(14), 8762; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph19148762 - 19 Jul 2022

Cited by 2 | Viewed by 1526

Abstract

Background: Pandemic preparedness of healthcare providers helps to mitigate future threats such as spread and fatality rates, as well as the management of the disease. Pharmacists are key partners with public health agencies, and the role of community pharmacists is becoming increasingly recognised in this COVID-19 pandemic. The study aimed to explore the emergency preparedness of community pharmacists (CPs) for COVID-19. Methods: A cross-sectional study was performed among community pharmacists using cluster sampling followed by convenient sampling. A self-administered questionnaire was formulated using references from the previous literature and the WHO preparedness checklist. Descriptive analysis was undertaken for the participants’ socio-demographic characteristics. All the data collected were entered into the Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 24 (SPSS V.24), (IBM SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 24.0. Armonk, NY: IBM Corp.) for analysis. Results: Most of the CPs had five or fewer years of practice experience, and they had all the mandatory information relating to the needs of their communities regarding the disease. The participants knew where to acquire these resources whenever needed. They were able to recognise the signs and symptoms of the disease. Most participants felt that they were confident to provide patient education and carry out their duties during these challenging times. There was a strong position correlation between preparedness and the perceived response of the participants. Conclusion: The community pharmacists in Malaysia are prepared enough for COVID-19 pandemic management and perceive that they can respond during any unprecedented situations, such as COVID-19. Community pharmacists were aware of the challenges that they need to face in their community regarding COVID-19. Full article

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Emergency Preparedness for Healthcare in Pandemic)

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