Hot off the press! our pilot study on vaccination centre modelling is officially published in the OPPI Y Magazine (Fall Issue). Our article is titled Developing a Pedestrian Simulation Model to Estimate a Vaccine Centre Capacity.
What is the pilot study about?
Our study explores the use of simulation technology to examine the issues raised. The study replicated a City of Toronto vaccination centre by using PTV Viswalk, a microscopic pedestrian traffic simulation tool, to simulate the interactions between pedestrians in the centre. The vaccination centre was modelled with six queuing areas through which pedestrians were routed. These areas include:
1) entrance, 2) pre-screening, 3) registration, 4) vaccination, 5) after care, and 6) check-out.
The study then used a wide range of patient and staff volumes to estimate the maximum capacity of the vaccination centre and the resulting waiting and service times incurred when maintaining the required level of physical distancing between pedestrians to keep the risk of viral transmission as low as possible.
Mass Vaccination Program
Mass vaccination of the general public is recognized as essential for preventing the spread of COVID-19, but a mass vaccination program on the scale required has never been undertaken before. As many existing health care sites (e.g., walk-in clinics) are not suitable for safely and efficiently providing service to large numbers of patients simultaneously, large unused facilities such as recreation centres and exhibition centres have been adapted. The adaptations raise various questions. What is the maximum capacity of the centre? Will physical distancing be maintained in the centre? What is the average wait time? What is the average service time? Although collecting information in real-time would answer some of these questions, issues relating to the cost and complexity of data collection and the privacy of citizens make real-time data collection impractical.
This study explores the use of simulation technology to examine the issues raised. Contact us today for more information.
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