A framework to evaluate the resilience of hospital networks

This paper puts forward as framework to evaluate the resilience of hospital networks. Natural and man-made disasters can lead to significant social, economic and socioeconomic losses. Enhancing the resilience of communities in face of disasters can reduce these losses. Resilience is the ability of a system to resist, absorb and eliminate the effects of a hazard and to resume its performance at the desired level at an acceptable time. The resilience of hospital network in a community is among the most critical factors in reducing the losses caused by disasters. However, in many situations, the failure of one or multiple hospitals in a network reduces the overall capacity of the network, forces the movement of patients from one hospital to another, and leads to significant losses. There is need for an appropriate index that can be utilized in order to evaluate and measure the resilience of hospital network and identify the opportunities for enhancing its resilience. In this paper, a hospital network resilience index is presented. A simulation framework is also introduced in order to measure the resilience of hospital network under uncertainties about the magnitude and consequence of hazard, response of various components of hospitals, and the performance of transportation network and lifelines such as electricity network. The proposed framework can be utilized in order to evaluate the impact of lack of hospital network resilience on its capacity to treat the casualties of a disaster, the movement of patients from one hospital to another as a result of inability of a hospital to provide services, and the subsequent losses. © 2018 The Authors. Published by Diamond Congress Ltd. Peer-review under responsibility of the scientific committee of the Creative Construction Conference 2018.