Empty Slots Research Articles

Criteria-based outpatient scheduling at a nephrology clinic: prospective evaluation of patient pre-assessment and its corresponding adaptive scheduling strategy

BackgroundOutpatient Clinics (OCs) are under pressure because of increasing patient volumes and provider shortages. At the same time, many patients with chronic diseases receive routine follow-up consultations that are not always necessary. These patients block access to care for patients that are in actual need for care. Pre-assessing patient charts has shown to reduce unnecessary outpatient visits. However, the resulting late cancellations due to the pre-assessment, challenge efficient alignment of capacity with actual patient demand, leading to either empty slots or overtime. This study aims to develop a method to analyse the effect of pre-assessing patients before inviting them to the OC. This involves 1) to select who should come and 2) to optimize the impact of pre-assessment on the schedule and efficient use of OC staff.MethodsThis prospective mixed-methods evaluation study consists of 1) an expert meeting to determine a pre-assessment strategy; 2) a retrospective cohort study to review the impact of this strategy (12 months of a Dutch nephrology OC); 3) mathematical optimization to develop an optimal criteria-based scheduling strategy; and 4) a computer simulation to evaluate the developed strategy. Primary outcomes are the staff idle time and staff overtime. Secondary outcomes evaluate the number of weekly offered appointments.ResultsThe expert group reached consensus about the pre-assessment criteria. 875 (18%) of the realized appointments in 2022 did not meet the OC visit pre-assessment criteria. In the best performing scheduling strategy, 94 slots (87% of the available capacity) should be scheduled on a weekly basis. For this schedule, 26.8% of the OC weeks will experience idle time (μ\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\mu$$\\end{document}=2.51, σ\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\sigma$$\\end{document}=1.44 appointment slots), and 21% of the OC weeks will experience overtime (μ\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\mu$$\\end{document}=2.26, σ\\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \\usepackage{amsmath} \\usepackage{wasysym} \\usepackage{amsfonts} \\usepackage{amssymb} \\usepackage{amsbsy} \\usepackage{mathrsfs} \\usepackage{upgreek} \\setlength{\\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \\begin{document}$$\\sigma$$\\end{document}=1.65 appointment slots) due to the variation in patient appointment requests. Using the pre-assessment strategy combined with the best performing scheduling strategy under full capacity (108 slots), up to 20% increase in patient demand can be handled with equal operational performance.ConclusionsThis evaluation study allows OC managers to virtually test operational impact of pre-assessment strategies on the capacity of their OC, and shows the potential of increasing efficient use of scarce healthcare capacity.Trial registrationNot applicable.

Implementasi Google Cloud Vision untuk Deteksi Ketersediaan Lahan Parkir Kendaraan Mobil di Perguruan Tinggi

The increasing number of car users in colleges has posed significant challenges in effectively managing parking lots. This research focuses on the implementation of Google Cloud Vision to detect and monitor the availability of car parking lots in a college environment. By utilizing cloud-based image processing services and machine learning algorithms from Google Cloud Vision, the proposed system aims to provide real-time analysis and reporting on parking slot availability. The methodology used involves capturing images of the parking area using strategically placed cameras, then uploading these images to Google Cloud Vision to detect the presence or absence of cars. The system is designed to be scalable, ensuring that it can handle different sizes and complexities of parking areas. Preliminary results show that the approach using Google Cloud Vision offers a high level of accuracy in identifying occupied and empty parking slots, thus providing a reliable tool for parking management in a college environment. This work discusses the development, implementation, and evaluation of the system, and highlights its potential in improving parking lot utilization efficiency and reducing the time users spend searching for available parking spaces.

IR Sensor based Smart Parking System

Nowadays congestion of traffic level increased with the increase in population. As the population increases, the utilization of vehicles also increases. It's becoming a difficult task to find a slot to park the vehicle. To overcome this problem, a smart parking system is introduced. Previously, there were some approaches to this system where Bluetooth and GPS tracker were used to find the empty slots, and different sensors were used for indoor and outdoor parking. In some approaches there was no security for the user’s details. Whereas in the proposed system, every slot has a number which makes it easier for the user to find out the empty slot. IR sensors are used to detect the vehicle and the empty slot is displayed on LCD as well as cloud server where the user’s details are secured. Smart parking system is an IoT based system which includes Raspberry pi, LED display, Cloud Server, Monitor and IR Sensors that are available in each parking slot. The proposed system leverages the advantages of IR sensor technology to accurately detect the presence of vehicles in parking spaces, provides real-time information to the users, and improves overall parking efficiency. The paper discusses the system architecture, sensor deployment strategies, and implementation, thereby showcasing the potential benefits of IR sensor-based smart parking systems. Index Terms: camera, cloud, parking, Raspberry Pi, sensors, vehicles

PROTOTYPE SMART PARKING AT STMIK AKBA BASED ON MICROCONTROLLER USING RADIO FREQUENCY IDENTIFICATION (RFID) TECHNOLOGY

This study aims to design a prototype smart parking using a microcontroller is expected to provide convenience for parking lot users at STMIK AKBA, making it easier for drivers to find out the availability of parking slots and where the location of the empty slots is in a parking lot and at the same time test the performance of the prototype using RFID. The results of this study indicate that using this system can provide information to parking users quickly and effectively. The results of the implementation of this system can run well based on the results of system testing in its use which get the results of the system's feasibility test with the average time for access takes 3 seconds and the average time for access to exit takes 6 seconds with a suitable category for use.

Electrical Machine Winding Performance Optimization by Multi-Objective Particle Swarm Algorithm

The present work aims to optimize the magnetomotive force and the end-winding leakage inductance from a discrete distribution of conductors in electrical machines through multi-objective particle swarm heuristics. From the development of an application capable of generating the conductor distribution for different machine configurations (single or poly-phase, single or double layer, integral or fractional slots, full or shortened pitch, with the presence of empty slots, etc.) the curves of magnetomotive force and the end-winding leakage inductance associated with the winding are computed. Taking as an optimal winding the one that presents, simultaneously, less harmonic distortion of the magnetomotive force and less leakage inductance, optimization by multi-objective particle swarm was used to obtain the optimal electrical machine configuration and the results are presented.

Development of an Android Application for Smart Parking System

Now-a-days, vehicle parking has become a major problem in urban areas with the shortage of parking spaces. It is very difficult and frustrating to find a parking space in most metropolitan areas, especially during the rush hours to solve this problem. The project entitled smart parking system using android application, the major motivation of this project is to reduce the traffic congestion in roads, multi storied buildings and malls due to unavailability of parking spaces. The proposed application provides an easy way for reservation of parking slot. In this application user can view various parking areas and also view whether space is available or not. The project displays the nearest empty slot if present with respect to user location. This system gives a further feature of cancelling the bookings. Users may even make price online primarily based totally at the time taken for the reserved area the quantity might be calculated and the person can make charge. This project provides a good insight into the guidance, monitoring and reservations components of the smart parking and directions to the future development.

EFFICIENT PARKING SPACE MANAGEMENT USING IOT AND WIRELESS COMMUNICATION

With the rapidly increasing urban population and their busy working schedule, people prefer private cars over public transport depending upon their requirements. This leads to the problem of finding parking spots for their vehicles, especially cars, which is a big issue everyone faces nowadays. Because of heavy working schedules, drivers hardly have time to spend in the parking lane. So, the demand is to develop a digital system that automatically detects and indicates vacant parking spots in the parking area. As the world is growing and tending to be more digital every day, this digital system will help to save time for a person in daily aspects which is a crucial necessity of today’s generation. This paper shows how the information is collected from multiple parking areas nearby each other to a single acknowledged unit for an indication of free parking slots in a particular area. The nRF24L01 is a transceiver module which provides reasonable and operative full- duplex RF choices. These transmitting and receiving communication modules used in similar illustrations come on a veritably controllable as well as affordable. The aim of this paper is to easily indicate the exact location/parking lot in the particular parking area. The list of empty slots will be displayed at the entrance of the parking lot. The system consists of a controlling unit, IR sensors, an LCD screen, antennas, etc. The use of this system for car parking will reduce manpower.

Electric Vehicle Routing Problem with States of Charging Stations

This paper proposes an electric vehicle routing problem, considers the states of charging stations and suggests solution strategies. The charging of electric vehicles is a main issue in the field of electric vehicle routing. There are many studies that find the locations of charging stations, recharging functions for the batteries of vehicles, and so on. However, the state of charging stations significantly affects the routes of electric vehicles, which is not much explored. The states may include open or closed charging stations, occupied or empty charging slots, and so on. This paper investigates how the states of charging stations are estimated and how routing strategies are determined. We formulate a mixed integer programming model and suggest how to solve the problem with an exact method. Numerical examples provide the optimal routing strategies of electric vehicles for the changing environments regarding the states of charging stations.

Solving Parking Problems with Micro Controller Smart Car Parking Systems

The aim of this paper is to provide a simple automatic car parking allocation system with basic components like microcontroller that provides solution to the problems in car parking allocation. Parking allocations provided in shopping complexes, malls, multi-store buildings etc usually have persons allocated to supervise manually the traffic and to allocate spaces available for parking, directing vehicles to be parked without any disturbances making the process more complex. A simple parking automation system with IR sensors provided at the parking space to detect the presence of vehicle parked, LED notification board to show specific empty parking slots and a display to direct individuals can avoid trafficking at the gateways of parking slots and helps them to park their vehicles easily. Therefore, the proposed research work designs and implements a prototype system model, which will regulate trafficking in parking garages along with providing information to the drivers about the availability of spaces.

Vete a freír cristales

Abstract The constructional idiom [IRSE/ANDAR(SE)[imperative] a CLAUSE[infinitive]] (e.g., Vete a freír espárragos, lit. ‘go to fry asparagus’; Iros a tomar viento, lit. ‘go to get wind’) is commonly used in Spanish to convey the speaker’s strong rejection, and is a hallmark of colloquial language. This makes it an excellent candidate for exploring the phenomenon of extravagance, both because of these characteristics and its structure, which includes an empty slot filled with a clause headed by an infinitive. This structural aspect contributes to variability, as its high token frequency also results in high type frequency. The corpus analysis (Sketch Engine) presented in this paper allows us to illustrate the relationship between creativity and intensification, as well as between innovation and convention. Besides, it underscores the gradual nature of creativity, culminating in extravagance, which speakers employ to gain salience and, in turn, amplify the expressiveness and emotional impact of their statements.

1949 Improving the utilisation rate of ‘hot slots’ in an outpatient frailty service

Abstract Background North Middlesex University Hospital runs an outpatient frailty service where patients are referred for a Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment. There is a daily ‘hot slot’ for patients who otherwise would have required hospital admission if not seen within seven days. We aimed to improve utilisation of hot slots from 50% to 100%. Empty hot slots result in the under-utilisation of pre-allocated resources and increase the workload of healthcare professionals in other departments. Methods Author ESK audited hot slot usage in November and December 2022, marking slots as ‘filled’ or ‘unfilled’. In January 2023 we established a clear referral process for the hot slots and implemented an education program targeted at referrers to increase awareness of the availability of hot slots and referral criteria. Authors ESK, NS and FM re-audited the hot slot usage from February to April 2023. Author FM analysed the data and conducted statistical testing of the results. Authors NS and FM produced visual representation of the data collected. Results After exclusion of periods where the hot slots were closed (n=13) including strike days, bank holidays and times with below minimum staffing; 82 hot slots were audited, pre-intervention (n=39) and post-intervention (n=43). The utilisation of hot slots increased from 51% pre-intervention to 86% post-intervention. Fisher's exact test shows this is statistically significant (p<0.0007). Conclusions The education program increased utilisation of hot slots but fell short of the targeted 100% utilisation rate. We made the hot slot available exclusively to the Geriatric Emergency Medicine (GEM) team for one week in August 2023 to assess whether this increases GEM utilisation of the hot slot. We intend to further analyse the data to review the appropriateness of referrals and try to improve this. A larger project could assess impact of hot slot usage on patient outcomes.

An Efficient and Scalable RFID Anti-Collision Algorithm on Optimal Partition and Collided Block Bit-Mapping

In RFID systems, many anti-collision algorithms, driven by the concept of rescheduling the response sequence between the reader and unidentified tags, have been put forward to solve tag collision problem, including ALOHA-based, tree-based and hybrid algorithms. In this paper, we propose a novel RFID anti-collision algorithm called EAQ-CBB, which adopts three main approaches: tag population estimation based on collided bit detection method, optimal partitions and trimmed query tree based on the strategy of collided block bit-mapping (QTCBB). The relatively accurate estimation of tag backlog and optimal partition ensure a great reduction of collisions in the initial phase. For each collided partition, a QTCBB process is introduced immediately, which eliminates all the empty slots and significantly reduces the collided slots. Simulation results show that EAQ-CBB performs good stability and scalability when the key parameters change. Compared with the existing algorithms, such as DFSA, QTI, T-GDFSA and CT, EAQ-CBB outperforms the others with high system throughput, low normalized latency and low normalized overhead at a low cost of energy, which makes it easier to be used widely in the efficient-aware and energy-aware applications.

Quantum Plasmonics in Sub-Atom-Thick Optical Slots.

We show using time-dependent density functional theory (TDDFT) that light can be confined into slot waveguide modes residing between individual atomic layers of coinage metals, such as gold. As the top atomic monolayer lifts a few Å off the underlying bulk Au (111), ab initio electronic structure calculations show that for gaps >1.5 Å, visible light squeezes inside the empty slot underneath, giving optical field distributions 2 Å thick, less than the atomic diameter. Paradoxically classical electromagnetic models are also able to reproduce the resulting dispersion for these subatomic slot modes, where light reaches in-plane wavevectors ∼2 nm-1 and slows to <10-2c. We explain the success of these classical dispersion models for gaps ≥1.5 Å due to a quantum-well state forming in the lifted monolayer in the vicinity of the Fermi level. This extreme trapping of light may explain transient "flare" emission from plasmonic cavities where Raman scattering of metal electrons is greatly enhanced when subatomic slot confinement occurs. Such atomic restructuring of Au under illumination is relevant to many fields, from photocatalysis and molecular electronics to plasmonics and quantum optics.

A Systematic Description of Imbrication in Nyakyusa

This paper offers a systematic description of imbrication in Nyakyusa (M31). The review of the literature indicates that, in Nyakyusa, imbrication, a phonological change involving the opaque difference between the input and output forms in the -ile suffix, has not been systematically described. Hence, the paper offers this description by identifying triggering conditions and reconstructing the phonological processes shaping imbrication. Data for this paper were collected in Kyela district through a review of written texts, narrative stories, observation and interviews. The findings indicate that the syllable structure of the verb is the main determinant of imbrication in Nyakyusa. Quite obviously, the process of imbrication involves the deletion of the consonant in the -ile, followed by metathesis whereby the last consonant of the stem fills the empty slot caused by the deletion of [l]. Then, various adjustments that follow, i.e., vowel coalescence, vowel deletion, vowel rising, leftward spread of vowel, and vowel lengthening, are meant to resolve hiatus. The paper concludes that, based on the review of literature, although imbrication is common in some Bantu languages, we noted some conditions and phonological processes shaping imbrication to be language specific. In this view, this paper recommends a systematic comparative description of imbrication in other Bantu languages.

An rPark-branded Proposed Smart Occupancy Detection System for Parking

Due to the growing of the city population, progressively more vehicles are moving through the urban area in demand for parking lots, often causal to the worldwide difficulty of traffic jams. The existing parking system does not have a decent method to know whether the slots are empty or not. So, the user/driver has to rummage around to find an empty slot. As a result, there is a lot of traffic jam on the road, which destroys the normal life of the people. This paper focuses on how to improve the existing parking lot’s occupancy detection system in a scientific way and proposed the smart parking occupancy detection system named rPark. rPark is offered as an innovative technique for detecting parking occupancy. For the initial stage, Ultra High Frequency static RFID chips are installed on the asphalt and cross-examined by RFID interrogator antennas over the parking spots to notice the usage status. A maximum of the difficulties of the existing state-of-the-art parking usage recognition methods are not existing in this scheme. rPark was examined and employed to illustrate an experimental analysis in a physical domain out-of-doors parking spot and has been verified to have a system’s parking detection accuracy is about 100%.

VDIU: VLC-Based Debugging Information Upload Method for Self-Powered Sensor Nodes

Currently, more and more self-powered sensor nodes have been deployed in remote and inaccessible areas, and thus online debugging of sensor nodes becomes more necessary and important. However, the existing sensor online debugging approaches mainly rely on original network infrastructure (such as Zigbee or NB-IoT). Once the communication infrastructure is invalid, it is almost impossible to retrieve debugging information and repair the lost self-powered sensor nodes. To this end, in our previous study, we employed the onboard optical modules of the self-powered sensor node to realize a Visible Light Communication(VLC)-based hybrid communication debugging system(VHCDS). In this paper, to improve the efficiency of uploading debugging information, we propose VDIU to optimize the digital pulse interval modulation applied in the uplink of VHCDS. This method reasonably groups and sorts the origin data to reduce the number of empty time slots (unused time slots) and complete data compression in source coding for saving energy. To improve the reliability of the uplink, we also design two frame synchronization mechanisms suitable for the receiver-side optical cameras of the uplink. One mechanism considers lightweight synchronization design via restricting the position of the frame header; the other one focuses on reducing the occupation of the downlink of VHCDS via predicting the position of the frame header using a temporal convolutional network (TCN). Experiments results illustrate that the upload efficiency using VDIU is higher 78% and 28% than DPIM and DH-PIM. Both synchronization mechanisms can arrive the similar performance, but the predicting mechanism reduces the 93% occupation on the downlink.

Unknown Tag Identification Protocol Based on Collision Slot Resolution in Large-Scale and Battery-Less RFID System

Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology is widely used in warehouse management and supply chain management. In the actual application, unknown tags such as newly added or incorrectly placed products will be placed into a certain area of the warehouse. Existing identification protocols can identify such unknown tags by collecting tag IDs and comparing them with back-end server. Alternatively, the known tags can be filtered through the filter vector to prevent interference from unknown tags and improve identification efficiency. However, there is a lack of consideration of the collision impact on identification efficiency. In this paper, we introduce the bit tracking technology to accelerate the identification process and propose a Bit-Tracking Based Strategy for Unknown Tag Identification (BTUTI) protocol. We solve the problem by means of known tag deactivation and unknown tag identify. First, by adopting bit tracking technology, the reader can easily locate the positions of the collision bit. By hashing the tags of these collision slots, the collision slots can be turned into resolvable slots, thus improving the utilization rate of slots. Second, in the expected non-empty slot, the reader can send command to deactivate the known tag and skip empty slots and irresolvable collision slots. The experiment proves that BTUTI can increase the time efficiency compared to the state-of-the-art.

Sequential clinical scheduling with stochastic patient re-entrance: Case of Mohs Micrographic Surgery

We study the problem of appointment scheduling for outpatient clinics with stochastic patient re-entrance. It is motivated by the scheduling problem for Mohs Micrographic Surgery, which is a popular technique for the excision of skin cancers. Re-entrance occurs when a patient repeats upstream processes during the single-day outpatient appointment, usually after a medical test. In some surgical procedures, the number of re-entrances for each patient is unknown until medical test results become available, causing long patient waiting time and clinic overtime. To address these challenges, we develop a stochastic slot model, SMART, that captures the key characteristics of the appointment processes and stochastic re-entrance, utilizing a delay before possible re-entrance. We then design a sequential scheduling algorithm that balances patient waiting, clinic overtime and patient throughput while considering stochastic complications such as no-shows, processing time variability, and the number of re-entrances per patient. We establish several theoretical properties of the algorithm, including the optimality of the resulting schedules for the sequential scheduling setting. We apply SMART to appointment scheduling for Mohs clinics, where patients may have same-day re-entrance due to repetitive skin excisions. We compare SMART schedules to others that ignore re-entrance and to current scheduling practices via simulation studies under a more realistic setting. Numerical experiments show that SMART schedules dominate other schedules, and ignoring re-entrance can cost huge loss in efficiency. Furthermore, SMART schedules exhibit a special ‘stair-stepping’ pattern for the number of appointments, with most patients assigned to the early slots and many empty slots at the end.

Park Tag

A major challenge for modern cities is how to maximize the productivity and reliability of urban infrastructure, such as minimizing road congestion by making better use of the limited car parking facilities that are available. We approach a special system for smart parking reservation in a commercial car parking area in an urban environment. This system is mainly designed to avoid unnecessary time conception to find an empty slot in a car parking area. By the same case we can also save more than 80 percentage of fuel wastage in a car parking area to finds the empty parking slot. Car parking problem is a major contributor and has been, still a major problem with increasing vehicle size in the luxurious segment and confined parking spaces in urban cities.

IoT Raspberry Pi Based Smart Parking System with Weighted K-Nearest Neighbours Approach

Due to the limited availability of parking slots in parking areas, drivers often have difficulty finding an empty parking slot. The number of parking slots available at a particular location is usually less than the number of vehicles. Hence, drivers spend a lot of time looking for vacant parking slots, which eventually delays the completion of their tasks, such as paying bills, attending a meeting, or visiting a patient at the hospital, etc. There are a couple of parking guidance systems that have been highlighted by the other researchers, but most of them lack real-time, convenient guidance. This research proposed a smart parking guidance system made of an IoT Raspberry Pi combined with an Android application that makes use of the weighted k nearest neighbours for positioning the vehicle. This was achieved through the use of Wi-Fi signal strength indicator fingerprinting, allowing for real-time navigation and parking detection. In order to achieve real-time parking over the internet, Raspberry Pi hardware and the ThingSpeak IoT cloud with ultrasonic sensors are used in the proposed method. An Android application was involved in this parking detection system, which adopted IoT approaches to estimate the location of users in real-time and provide routes using route-finding techniques to assist drivers in finding their desired parking slots. Data from the sensors was processed and translated into the Raspberry Pi using the Python programming language. They were sent using the Message Telemetry Transport protocol to send parking data to the ThingSpeak IoT cloud in real-time. This data was displayed via the Android app. The user is then able to view each available parking slot, acquire the route, and be directed with high accuracy to the parking slots of their choice. In this study, advanced sensing and communication technologies were used together with the weighted k nearest neighbours algorithm for positioning and wayfinding in order to improve parking guidance accuracy. Based on the experimental results, the proposed system showed a lower average error rate of 1.5 metres in comparison to other positioning techniques, such as GPS, or other similar algorithms for positioning, such as maximum a posteriori, which have shown average errors of 2.3 metres and 3.55 metres, respectively, a potential increase of more than 35% from the previous error rate. Doi: 10.28991/CEJ-2023-09-08-012 Full Text: PDF