A decision support system for hospital emergency departments designed using agent-based modeling and simulation

This paper presents the results of an ongoing project whose objective is to develop a model and a simulation that, used as Decision Support System, aid the heads of Hospital Emergency Departments to make the best informed decisions possible. The defined model is a pure Agent-Based Model, formed entirely of the rules governing the behavior of the agents that populate the system. Two distinct types of agents have been identified, active and passive. Active agents represent persons, whereas passive agents represent services and reactive systems. The actions of agents and the communication among them are represented using Moore state machines. The model also includes the environment in which agents move and interact. The simulation has been implemented using NetLogo, and it has been used to evaluate the potential benefits for the ED of the derivation to primary care services of those patients who attend emergency services without requiring an urgent attention.