RH-RT: A Data Analytics Framework for Reducing Wait Time at Emergency Departments and Centres for Urgent Care

Abstract

Right Hospital – Right Time (RH-RT) is the conceptualization of the use of descriptive, predictive and prescriptive analytics with real-time data from Accident & Emergency (A&E)/Emergency Departments (ED) and centers for urgent care; its objective is to derive maximum value from wait time data by using data analytics techniques, and making them available to both patients and healthcare organizations. The paper presents an architecture for the implementation of RH-RT that is specific to the authors’ current work on a digital platform (NHSquicker) that makes available live waiting time from multiple centers of urgent care (e.g., A&E/ED, Minor Injury Units) in Devon and Cornwall. The focus of the paper is on the development of a Hybrid Systems Model (HSM) comprising of healthcare business intelligence, forecasting techniques and computer simulation. The contribution of the work is the conceptual RH-RT framework and its implementation architecture that relies on near real-time data from NHSquicker.