Abstract
Objective To explore the feasibility and advantage of the drones in a county emergency medical service system. Methods The study was conducted in Changxing County, Zhejiang Province from January to September 2018. The Changxing County People's Hospital and the health centers within its radius of 25 km were included in the study. Three types of indicators were obtained by using commercial drones to transfer simulated first-aid medical supplies from health centers to county people's hospitals: (1)The flight time of the drone; (2) The road traffic time measured by Baidu map and Tencent map software of the above-mentioned route at midnight; (3) The road traffic time measured by Amap software of these routes at 0: 00, 8: 00, 10:00, 12:00, 14:00, 16:00, 18:00, 20:00. The road traffic time at different time points measured by map softwares and drones flight time were compared. Wilcoxon symbolic rank test was used for statistical analysis, and P value of < 0.05 was considered statistically significant. Results (1) A total of 10 health centers were involved in this study, the air straight-line distance between them and the county people's hospital was (10.97±3.59) km, and the road traffic distance was (13.61±4.95) km. (2) The flight time of drone was (16.35±5.15) min, less than road traffic time measured by Amap, Baidu and Tencent map software, which were (21.40±5.15) min, (22.50±6.11) min, (22.00±5.23) min, respectively (P< 0.01). (3)The road traffic time measured by Amap software was longer than that of drones from 0:00 to 20:00 (P< 0.01), with the maximum time of (27.80±6.12) min at 18:00, and the minimum time of (21.40±5.15) min at midnight. Drones could save up 14.07 min at most and 2.8 min at least, with an average save of (7.98±1.32) min. Conclusions Drone might be used to transfer first aid medical supplies between health centers in a county area, which is faster than road transportation. It has a better application prospect and is worth to further study. Key words: Drone; Emergency medical service system; County; Partnership health center
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