Priority Levels Research Articles

Multi-objective optimization for comprehensive water, energy, food nexus modeling

The precarious circumstances surrounding the depletion of resources stress the need for efficient resource management in a manner that prevents the improvement of one resource sector without a potential expense of another. The objective of this work is to provide a holistic water energy food nexus (WEFN) model that accounts for the three sectors and their interlinkages, while securing a healthy and sustainable diet within environmental planetary boundary limits and economic budgets. Multi-objective optimization is applied in the Python software, where the GEKKO package optimizer is used. In addition to optimization, a Pareto analysis yields a frontier of optimal solutions for varying levels of objective function priorities. Excel is used to import case study data and export model results. Different case study scenarios showcase the model and demonstrate how resource availability and imposed self-sufficiency impact resource consumption (energy: 184–428 MWh, water: 7–64 km3) and allocation across sectors. The Pareto analysis illustrates the trade-offs between nexus sectors and reflects how priorities drive interactions between conflicting objectives. A Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) analysis reveals the role of imposed constraints on energy resource use and resource supply in achieving SDG targets (achievement rates ranging from 0.43 to 93 %). Thus, the contribution of this work is a holistic WEFN model that includes interlinkage, dietary/nutritional, environmental, and economic constraints. The design of this work, combining Excel with Python, serves as a platform for facilitated case study generation in a manner that will improve the deficient understanding of WEFN interlinkages and their interactions. Results shed light on interactions between sectors and the complex process of balancing the various factors in determining optimal resource allocation and healthy diet composition. These results also highlight the potential of this work to serve as a decision support tool.

A Collaborative Transit Signal Priority Method Considering Gaming among Traffic Participants

How to realize the game equilibrium between bus and nontransit vehicle is a hot topic in the field of transit signal priority (TSP). To this end, a collaborative transit signal priority (Co-TSP) method is proposed. The core of Co-TSP is a two-objective optimization problem which takes the expected delays of buses and the average delays of nontransit vehicles as the objectives. Different from previous studies, Co-TSP uses game theory to realize collaborative optimization, instead of transforming the problem into a single objective optimization problem by weighting. A finite state machine-based algorithm is developed to estimate the average delays of nontransit vehicles. The stochasticity of bus arrival time is also considered in the estimation of bus delays to improve the robustness. Candidate timing plans obtained by the nondominated sorting genetic algorithm (NSGA) are divided into three priority levels based on the delays of buses. The final timing plans can be picked intuitively from the candidates by rules representing expert knowledge and demands to control the priority level. Co-TSP guarantees theoretically by preliminary screening that the expected delays of bus after optimization must be no higher than that before optimization. Simulation experiments are conducted in Shanghai, China, to verify the performance. Results show that Co-TSP reduces the delays of buses by 27.7%∼41.0% and still performs well under low and high congestion levels, while the conventional TSP (CTSP) fails in some cases. Priority control proves to be effective at last. The research provides a new idea for the benefit allocation among participants at intersections.

Model of knowledge management readiness and initiatives for improvement in government agencies

PurposeThe application of knowledge management (KM) in government agencies is one strategy to deal with government problems effectively and efficiently. This study aims to identify KM readiness critical success factors (CSFs), measure the level of readiness for KM implementation, identify improvement initiatives and develop KM readiness models for government agencies. This model plays a role in the implementation of KM successful.Design/methodology/approachThe level of readiness is obtained by calculating the factor weights of the opinions of experts using the entropy method. The readiness value is calculated from the results of the questionnaire with average descriptive statistics. The method for analysis of improvement initiatives adopts the Asian Productivity Organization framework. The model was developed based on a systems approach and expert validation.FindingsReliability testing with a Cronbach’s alpha value for entropy is 0.861 and the questionnaire is 0.920. The result of measuring KM readiness in government agencies is 75.29% which is at level 3 (ready/needs improvement). The improvement in the level of readiness is divided into two parts: increasing the value of factors that are still less than ready (75%) and increasing the value of all factors to level 4 (84%). The model consists of three main sections: input (KMCSFs), process (KM readiness) and output (KM implementation).Research limitations/implicationsThe first suggestion is that the sample of employees used in this study is still in limited quantities, that is, 50% of the total population. The second limitation is determining KMCSFs. According to experts, combining this study with factor search and correlation computations would make it more complete. The expert’s advice aims to obtain factors that can be truly tested both subjectively and objectively. Finally, regarding literature selection for future research, it is recommended to use a systematic literature review such as the preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analyses and Kitchenham procedures.Practical implicationsThe management must also prioritize KMCSF according to its level and make KMCSF a key performance indicator. For example, at the priority level, active leadership in KM is the leading performance indicator of a leader. Then at the second priority level, management can make a culture of sharing an indicator of employee performance through a gamification program. The last point that management must pay attention to in implementing all of these recommendations is to collaborate with relevant stakeholders, for example, those authorized to draft regulations and develop human resources.Originality/valueThis study proposes a novel comprehensive framework to measure and improve KM implementation readiness in government agencies. This study also proposes a KMCSF and novel KM readiness model with its improvement initiatives through this framework.

IMPLEMENTATION OF BASIC INTERNATIONAL SMART GRID STANDARDS IN UKRAINE: CURRENT STATE

In this paper, the main components of the basic model of the Smart Grid architecture according to the standard IEC TR 63097:2017 "Smart Grid Roadmap" are considered. The list of basic and particularly important international standards, which have a significant impact on the application of Smart Grid, has been identified and analyzed. A group of standards describing the basic principles of Smart Grid systems application is selected. These groups are unifying and allow to eliminate contradictions between other existing standards, to ensure their consistency. The development of a strategy and the creation of a road map for the adoption of modern European and international standards in Ukraine in the field of Smart Grid substantiated. A list of relevant directions and functional systems necessary for the implementation of the components of the Smart Grid concept is given. These directions require a detailed analysis to establish priority levels during the implementation of relevant modern European and international standards in Ukraine, taking into account the specifics of the Ukrainian electricity market.

Regularised Semi-parametric Composite Likelihood Intensity Modelling of a Swedish Spatial Ambulance Call Point Pattern

Motivated by the development of optimal dispatching strategies for prehospital resources, we model the spatial distribution of ambulance call events in the Swedish municipality Skellefteå during 2014–2018 in order to identify important spatial covariates and discern hotspot regions. Our large-scale multivariate data point pattern of call events consists of spatial locations and marks containing the associated priority levels and sex labels. The covariates used are related to road network coverage, population density, and socio-economic status. For each marginal point pattern, we model the associated intensity function by means of a log-linear function of the covariates and their interaction terms, in combination with lasso-like elastic-net regularized composite/Poisson process likelihood estimation. This enables variable selection and collinearity adjustment as well as reduction of variance inflation from overfitting and bias from underfitting. To incorporate mobility adjustment, reflecting people’s movement patterns, we also include a nonparametric (kernel) intensity estimate as an additional covariate. The kernel intensity estimation performed here exploits a new heuristic bandwidth selection algorithm. We discover that hotspot regions occur along dense parts of the road network. A mean absolute error evaluation of the fitted model indicates that it is suitable for designing prehospital resource dispatching strategies. Supplementary materials accompanying this paper appear online.

Scheduling pre-operative assessment clinic with answer set programming

AbstractThe problem of scheduling pre-operative assessment clinic (PAC) consists of assigning patients to a day for the exams needed before a surgical procedure, taking into account patients with different priority levels, due dates and operators availability. Realizing a satisfying schedule is of upmost importance for a hospital, since delay in PAC can cause delay in the subsequent phases, thus lowering patients’ satisfaction. In this paper, we propose a two-phase solution to the PAC problem: in the first phase, patients are assigned to a day taking into account a default list of exams; then, in the second phase, having the actual list of exams needed by each patient, we use the results of the first phase to assign a starting time to each exam. We first present a mathematical formulation for both problems. Further, we present a solution where modeling and solving are done via answer set programming. We then introduce a rescheduling solution that may come into play when the scheduling solution cannot be applied fully. Experiments employing synthetic benchmarks on both scheduling and rescheduling show that both solutions provide satisfying results in short time. We finally show the implementation and usage of a web application that allows to run our scheduling solution and analyze the results graphically in a transparent way.

The attitude of the patients of a multidisciplinary hospital to the processes of digitalization in modern healthcare: A cross-sectional continuous study

BACKGROUND: This article is devoted to the impact of the digitalization of modern healthcare on the nature of relationships between a doctor and a patient.
 AIM: To assess the level of readiness of the patients in the city hospital for the introduction of digital technologies in the system of providing medical services.
 MATERIALS AND METHODS: The study was based on the results of a questionnaire survey of 154 patients in city hospitals in JulyAugust 2022 in Nizhny Novgorod. The survey questions included studying the use by modern day patients of various methods of digital communication with medical workers, the impact of the availability of medical information on the internet on the level of patients trust on a doctor, and patients opinions about the prospects for solving problems of modern healthcare through digitalization.
 RESULTS: The results of the survey revealed that 104 (67.5%) patients do not use digital communications, and 94 (61%) have no intention of using them. Among the prospects for the use of digital technologies in healthcare, the most popular for respondents were getting referrals for medical services (n=83, 53.9%), a prescription (n=57, 37%), and documents certifying temporary disability (n=43, 27, 9%). Only 8 (5.2%) respondents systematically check the diagnoses and prescriptions received from the attending physician on the internet and 25 (16.2%) do this from time to time. Only 2 (1.3%) respondents stated that they have a priority level of trust in recommendations from internet sources, and the rest of the patients trust their real attending physicians more.
 CONCLUSION: A modern patient seeks to receive medical care in real contact with a doctor, considering digital technologies mainly as a tool that addresses formal issues that arise when visiting medical organizations.

Spatial Prioritizing Brownfields Catering for Green Infrastructure by Integrating Urban Demands and Site Attributes in a Metropolitan Area

Global urbanization and post-industrialization have resulted in the emergence of a large number of brownfields. The integration of brownfields into green infrastructure (GI) has been widely recognized as a sustainable development strategy in metropolitan areas. It is important to spatially prioritize brownfields catering for GI, which can enable the greatest enhancement of urban functions. Various studies have assessed brownfield site attributes or urban demands to define the priority of brownfields transformed into GI, but it is key to consider the coupling coordination between urban demands and site attributes in order to achieve more accurate matches. In this paper, an approach is proposed for assessing the priority of brownfields catering for GI in Xuzhou, China; this involved calculating the coupling coordination degree between site attributes and urban function demands, including heat island mediation, stormwater regulation, disaster prevention, landscape aesthetics improvement, and leisure and recreation increments. The results showed that 42.52% of the brownfields have a high degree of coupling coordination (“good coordination” and “primary coordination”) between site attributes and urban demands. Furthermore, 40.82% of the brownfields (120 plots) were selected to be integrated into urban GI; these are not only located in high urban functional demand areas, but also have a high coupling coordination degree. These brownfields were divided into three priority levels, and 4.42% and 17.69% of the total brownfields are of very high and high priority. Our proposed approach offers an accurate decision-making tool for urban GI optimization in high-density built-up metropolitan areas, and offers guidance for brownfield redevelopment.

The Economics of Technology Transfer in The Environmental Safety of Enterprises for the Energy Transition

Introduction. European countries are at different stages of transition to a new energy system due to different levels of energy dependence, geographical conditions, and priorities of national administration. The use of information technology and innovative developments in the energy field allows for reducing energy production costs, improving resource use efficiency, reducing environmental impact, and ensuring energy security. Modern energy is reaching a new qualitative level due to technology transfer and government policy. Such an energy transition in the industry requires time, unfolding globalization processes, implementing sustainable development strategy and solving greening problems. 
 Aim and tasks. The aim of the study is to assess the level of the economic base of technology transfer in the creation and functioning of a new energy system based on the principles of environmental safety of modern enterprises in EU countries.
 Results. The theoretical model is considered, which explains the essence and factors in the implementation of the new energy system of production enterprises in the cross-section of the EU countries. The ranking of European countries is given based on the calculation of the use of final electricity consumption per dollar per capita and one percent of renewable energy consumption minus the tax burden. Thus, some countries already have significant indicators that indicate the effectiveness of the transition to a new energy structure of their national enterprises. And such results do not directly depend on the share of the use of renewable energy sources and the reduction of the use of coal. But the share of more than 60% of the use of renewable energy and the significant tax burden placed on the final household consumers of electricity are general signs of the implementation of such a transition. Enterprises use such a transition mechanism more effectively in EU countries, where more than 60%. In economic terms, such transitions of enterprises are carried out at the expense of the lion's share of the tax burden on electricity use by end consumers – households.
 Conclusions. The study of the economic basis of technology transfer in the creation and functioning of a new energy system based on the principles of environmental safety of modern enterprises in EU countries is of great importance for improving energy efficiency and achieving environmental safety in the region as a whole. The research will be useful for government bodies that are engaged in shaping energy policy, regulating the energy sector, and ensuring environmental safety.

Changes in behavioral priority influence the accessibility of working memory content

Evolving behavioral goals require the existence of selection mechanisms that prioritize task-relevant working memory (WM) content for action. Selecting an item stored in WM is known to blunt and/or reverse information loss in stimulus-specific representations of that item reconstructed from human brain activity, but extant studies have focused on all-or-none circumstances that allow or disallow an agent to select one of several items stored in WM. Conversely, behavioral studies suggest that humans can flexibly assign different levels of priority to different items stored in WM, but how doing so influences neural representations of WM content is unclear. One possibility is that assigning different levels of priority to items in WM influences the quality of those representations, resulting in more robust neural representations of high- vs. low-priority WM content. A second – and non-exclusive – possibility is that asymmetries in behavioral priority influence how rapidly neural representations of high- vs. low-priority WM content can be selected and reported. We tested these possibilities in two experiments by decoding high- and low-priority WM content from EEG recordings obtained while human volunteers performed a retrospectively cued WM task. Probabilistic changes in the behavioral relevance of a remembered item had no effect on our ability to decode it from EEG signals; instead, these changes influenced the latency at which above-chance decoding performance was reached. Thus, our results indicate that probabilistic changes in the behavioral relevance of WM content influence the ease with which memories can be selected independently of their strength.

Analisa Karakteristik Daerah Untuk Menentukan Strategi Penagihan Rekening Listrik Konsumen PT PLN (Persero) Yang Efektif dan Efisien Dengan Metode AHP (Analytical Hierarchy Process)

Like companies that are oriented to the buying and selling business in general, PT PLN (Persero) or PLN also has the same business risk, namely the existence of arrears on account receivables arising from electricity buying and selling transactions with consumers. These arrears cannot be avoided because PLN consumers have different characteristics, one of which is the economic factor of the consumers themselves. In addition, because of force majeure is also one of the causes of arrears in electricity buying and selling transactions, including natural disasters and other calamities. By getting cash in from electricity bills collection, PLN's operations will of course be maintained so that service to customers can be even better. However, it is necessary to carry out an analysis related to the billing mechanism used using external factors to determine customer characteristics based on regional conditions. One method that is relevant and has a consistency value calculation in determining the priority level of criteria is the Analytical Hierarchy Process (AHP) method. The expected results of this study are a system that can provide recommendations for alternative billing strategies based on characteristics per region so that the hierarchy formed is acceptable for decision making.

Implementation planning for equitable tobacco treatment services: a mixed methods assessment of contextual facilitators and barriers in a large comprehensive cancer center.

Tobacco use among cancer patients is associated with an increased mortality and poorer outcomes, yet two-thirds of patients continue using following diagnosis, with disproportionately higher use among racial/ethnic minority and low socioeconomic status patients. Tobacco treatment services that are effectively tailored and adapted to population characteristics and multilevel context specific to settings serving diverse patients are needed to improve tobacco cessation among cancer patients. We examined tobacco use screening and implementation needs for tobacco treatment services to inform equitable and accessible delivery within a large comprehensive cancer center in the greater Los Angeles region. We conducted a multi-modal, mixed methods assessment using electronic medical records (EMR), and clinic stakeholder surveys and interviews (guided by the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research). Approximately 45% of patients (n = 11,827 of 26,030 total) had missing tobacco use history in their EMR. Several demographic characteristics (gender, age, race/ethnicity, insurance) were associated with greater missing data prevalence. In surveys (n = 32), clinic stakeholders endorsed tobacco screening and cessation services, but indicated necessary improvements for screening/referral procedures. During interviews (n = 13), providers/staff reported tobacco screening was important, but level of priority differed as well as how often and who should screen. Several barriers were noted, including patients' language/cultural barriers, limited time during visits, lack of smoking cessation training, and insurance coverage. While stakeholders indicated high interest in tobacco use assessment and cessation services, EMR and interview data revealed opportunities to improve tobacco use screening across patient groups. Implementing sustainable system-level tobacco cessation programs at institutions requires leadership support, staff training, on routine screening, and intervention and referral strategies that meet patients' linguistic/cultural needs.

Improving Communication of Peer-Review Conference Outcomes: A Practical Experience

The aim of this work was to describe the design and implementation of a more robust workflow for communicating outcomes from a peer-review chart rounds conference. We also provide information regarding cycle times, plan revisions, and other key metrics that we have observed since initial implementation. A multidisciplinary team of stakeholders including physicians, physicists, and dosimetrists developed a revised peer-review workflow that addressed key needs to improve the prior process. Consensus terminology was developed to reduce ambiguity regarding the priority of peer-review outcomes and to clarify expectations of the treating physician in response to peer-review outcomes. A custom workflow software tool was developed to facilitate both upstream and downstream processes from the chart rounds conference. The peer-review outcomes of the chart rounds conference and resulting plan changes for the first 18 months of implementation were summarized. In the first 18 months after implementation of the revised processes, 2294 plans were reviewed, and feedback priority levels assigned. Across all cases with feedback, the median time for the treating attending physician to acknowledge conference comments was 1 day and was within 7 calendar days for 89.1% of cases. Conference feedback was acknowledged within 1 day for 74 of 115 (64.3%) cases with level 2 comments and for 18 of 21 (85.7%) cases with level 3 comments (P=.054). Contours were modified in 13 of 116 (11%) cases receiving level 2 feedback and 10 of 21 (48%) cases receiving level 3 feedback (P < .001). The treatment plan was revised in 18 of 116 (16%) cases receiving level 2 feedback and 13 of 21 (61%) cases receiving level 3 feedback (P < .001). We successfully implemented a workflow to improve upstream and downstream processes for a chart rounds conference. Standardizing how peer-review outcomes were communicated and recording physician responses allow for improved ability to monitor conference activities.

The Customer Satisfaction Measurement Using SERVQUAL Method: Case Study in Printing Company

&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Printing business development in Makassar increases significantly, reaching 1200 businesses in 2022, making business more competitive. Besides product innovation, service quality is an important factor in supporting winning market competition. Kedai Kaos Makassar is Small Medium Enterprise (SME) that produces screen printing products. In order to win the market competition, Kedai Kaos Makasar needs to evaluate service qualities. The priorities of service attributes must be determined to solve the biggest problem in the service quality area. The SERVQUAL method is one tool that can use the determination of quality criteria gaps in the business process. The differences between perception and expectation can be evaluated by questioners. Importance Performance Analysis (IPA) is used for matrix analysis with four quadrants describing scale priority. The research aims to find out how the level of consumer satisfaction and priority attributes influence service quality in Kedai Kaos Makassar. The sample in this study amounted to 72 people with purposive sampling. The SERVQUAL method which had five attributes was used in this study. The IPA value was used for getting attribute priority. The perception and expectation values were 4,19 and 4,68 which meant customer dissatisfaction with Kedai Kaos Makassar’s service. The SERVQUAL dimension scores (reliability, responsiveness, assurance, empathy, and tangible) were -0,74; -0,40; -0,61; -0,62; -0,43 sequentially. The SERVQUAL values meant all dimensions in negative value. The IPA value in the first quadrant was attributed T3, T4, T10, T8, and T5 considered the most important but not satisfying.&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt; &lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;&lt;p&gt;&lt;strong&gt;&lt;em&gt;Keywords: Service Quality, SERVQUAL, IPA, Printing Company&lt;/em&gt;&lt;/strong&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

MULTIMOORA Method-Based Schweizer–Sklar Operations for CO2 Geological Storage Site Selection Under Pythagorean Fuzzy Environment

The site selection of CO2 geological storage facilities is essential for the development of safe and efficient carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) projects. Normally, CO2 geological storage site selection can be regarded as a complex multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) problem. The aim of this paper is to present an integrated decision-making method for solving the site selection problem for CO2 geological storage. To achieve this goal, this method is based on multi-objective optimization by ratio analysis plus the full multiplicative form (MULTIMOORA) method and prioritized aggregation operators in Pythagorean fuzzy environment. The academic contributions of this study include: first, some Pythagorean fuzzy Schweizer–Sklar prioritized aggregation (PFSSPA) operators are proposed, which take into account the priority levels of criteria and the risk preferences of decision makers. The excellent properties of these operators are given. Then this study extends the classical MULTIMOORA method based on the developed aggregation operators (named PFSSPA-MULTIMOORA), and the calculation process of this method is described in detail. Subsequently, on the basis of the constructed criteria system, the PFSSPA-MULTIMOORA method is applied to rank the alternatives. Finally, we successfully utilized the PFSSPA-MULTIMOORA method to solve the site selection problem of CO2 geological storage in China. A comparative analysis of existing methods verifies the effectiveness and robustness of the proposed method. This work can provide advanced decision support for researchers and practitioners.

Impacto de la pandemia de la COVID-19 en la actividad de los servicios de urgencias de atención primaria: estudio comparativo entre periodos de 2019 y 2020

ObjectiveTo compare the care provided by primary care emergency services during the COVID19 lockdown (March-June 2020) and the same period in 2019. DesignRetrospective descriptive study. SettingBasic Health Area of Granada. Population10.790 emergency reports, 3.319 in 2020 and 7.471 in 2019. OutcomesAge, sex, service, shifts, referrals, priority levels, care times, previous processes, and reasons for consultation. T-Student and Chi Square were used for continuous and categorical variables. Effect size (Cohen's d) and OR along with 95% CI were calculated. ResultsThe patients attended by primary care emergency services decreased in 2020 compared to 2019, but the percentage of Priority V cases (p<0.01), home discharges (p=0.01) and hospital transfers (p<0.01) increased, and referrals to family doctors (p<0.01) decreased. In 2020, the percentage of emergencies at night (p<0.01) and in low-income neighborhoods (p<0.01) increased. Waiting time for classification decreased (p<0.01), but total care time increased in 2020 (p<0.01). The patients seen in 2020 were older (p<.001), and with a greater number of previous processes (p<0.01), highlighting patients with anxiety, depression, or somatization (p<0.01) and diabetes (p=0.041). Consultations related to various symptoms of COVID19, mental health problems and chronic pathologies increased. ConclusionsPrimary care emergency services offer additional advantages in situations such as the COVID19 pandemic, as they allow channeling part of the health demand.

IT RISK MANAGEMENT ANALYSIS ON BANK XYZ E-BANKING SERVICE SYSTEM USING ISO 31000

The growth of information technology is now forcing businesses to innovate, one of which is in the banking sector. Electronic banking or e-banking is a new system in the banking world, where the existence of e-banking can make it easier for customers to carry out banking activities. Bank XYZ has also used this e-banking service system where the services are Mobile Banking, Personal Internet Banking, Corporate Internet Banking. but there are several risks that may occur ranging from low to high level risk. The purpose of this research is to carry out a risk assessment using the ISO 3100 risk management standard on the e-banking application of Bank XYZ. The results show that there are 20 possible risks that occur and are divided into two categories, namely those that may occur from outside and from within the company. Risk analysis shows that risk has several types of impacts from small scale to disaster scale. There are also several types of risk management depending on the type of risk and the priority level of the risk, namely risk avoidance, risk sharing, risk mitigation, and risk acceptance.

A prioritized decision making method for reliability allocation: In optimistic and pessimistic view

Reliability allocation is a very important problem during early design and development phases of a system. There are several reliability allocation techniques which are used to achieve the target reliability. The feasibility of objectives (FOO) technique is one of them that is widely used to perform system reliability allocation. But this technique has two fundamental shortcomings. The first is the measurement scale and the second is that it does not consider the order weight of the reliability allocation factors. The prioritization of the factors is also an important topic in decision making. Practically, all factors in multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) are not in the same priority level. Hence, in decision making situation, it is usual for decision makers to consider different priority factors. So, considering the prioritization of the factors, a reliability allocation method is proposed here to overcome the shortcomings of the FOO technique. Also, a case study on reliability allocation in airborne radar system is considered here to verify the efficiency of the proposed approach. Finally, the results are calculated in different optimistic and pessimistic view point and compared with the FOO technique. This comparison exhibits the advantages and supremacy of the proposed approach.

Selection of HVAC technology for buildings in the tropical climate case study

In this paper, the integral performance indicator for selecting HVAC systems (ACPI) is applied to select the Air Conditioning (AC) system with better results in their life cycle for a typical building in Barranquilla, Colombia. The AC systems under study were: direct expansion system (Split and VRF), air-cooled system (VAC and VAV), and water-cooled system (Chiller). Of the six selection criteria of ACPI, the energy consumption index (EC) and thermal comfort (TC) were calculated through energy simulation of buildings, the regulations were used for IAQ and carbon emissions (CE), and were estimated the investment costs (IC) and operating and maintenance costs (OMC). The best-performance AC system for the building was the air-cooled AC system got the best ACPI values between 25 % and 22.4 %, followed by the water-cooled system with 22.3 %, and finally the direct expansion systems between 16.8 % and 13.5 %, influencing in this level of priority the IAQ and IC criteria. This study contributes to introducing in Colombia a multifactorial analysis to select the more proper AC system technology according to the building and location conditions.

Gynecological Cancer Surgeries during COVID -19 Pandemic - An Experience from Tertiary Care Hospital of Pakistan

Background: Immunocompromised cancer patients stand high case fatality risk if encountered severe infection. This study aims to evaluate outcomes and complications of gynecological cancer surgeries performed during COVID-19 pandemic. Methods: A retrospective study conducted at Aga Khan University hospital, Pakistan. Patient’s medical records who underwent gynecologic cancer surgery or deferred between March-December 2020 were reviewed. Age, BMI, comorbid, COVID-19 status, clinical stage of disease and intraoperative data were collected. Post-operative complications per Clavien-Dindo classification i.e., Infection, thromboembolism, Urinary/bowel problems, and mortality within 30 days were noted. Statistical analysis performed using SPSS-19. Mean, SD ratios calculated for age and BMI. Frequency/percentages for priority levels and Categorical variables were equated using Chi square test. Results: Total 116 patients were included. Early-stage disease found in 64% patients. Surgical approach was laparotomy in 77.6%, including 48% complex surgeries. Prioritization based on BGCS framework, including 89% levels 2 and 11% level 3. PCR testing for all pre-operative patients initiated late in institute hence done in 77% however verbal screening performed in 90% patients. Two patients found COVID positive, so surgery delayed. Post operative complications of grade 1, grade 4a and grade 5 were observed in four patients. Twelve patients had clinical suspicion of COVID post operatively, 3 were found to be positive and one required ICU care. Conclusion: During pandemic, treatment provision posed challenge due to concern of infection to both patients and healthcare workers. However, with adequate preventive measures, cancer surgeries can be performed with low risk of severe complications and post-surgical COVID positivity. Keywords: COVID-19, Gynecology Oncology, Surgery, Guidelines