Project Milestone 1 ‐ Scenarios - SENG-350-2024-fall/Team-1 GitHub Wiki

1. System Description

MisterED System Description

The goal of MisterED is to reduce and control the load on the Emergency Department. MisterED will achieve this by providing real-time triage support from online medical professionals and offering users more flexibility with being able to wait for assistance and direction from the comfort of their own home. For this Milestone we have made the assumption that the MisterED system is to be implemented in British Columbia and supports local users by being able to log in with the BC Services Card app.

The MisterED application will show a disclaimer on the main page directing people experiencing life-threatening symptoms or injuries to immediately contact 9-1-1/EMS for quicker emergency support which persists on every page.

There are 5 primary actors that we have identified will use or interact with the MisterED system in their own respective ways:

Users / Patients
Online Medical Professionals
In-Person Medical Professionals
First Responders / EMS
System Administrators

General users will log into the MisterED application using their BC Services Card app, which improves the service that MisterED can offer since users with a valid BC Services Card have their health information stored in the Medical Information Database, meaning they won't have to input or update their medical history or conditions. Once logged in, a user will be able to edit their profile, see nearest ED and ED wait times, undergo a virtual triage process, view their place in the ED queue, and receive a notification when it is their turn to visit the ED.

The primary support for users that MisterED focuses on is the virtual triage, since diagnosing patients correctly and helping them is a priority. Once a user has selected to undergo a virtual triage, they will be asked to input their symptoms and will henceforth considered a Patient. The patient's case will be placed in a queue for the Online Medical Professionals to view and triage, and if the system detects the patient has inputted severe but not life-threatening symptoms their case will jump to the front of the queue so they can be triaged as soon as possible. Once triaged, patients will receive follow-up directions and be placed in an ED priority-based queue by the Online Medical Professional. Patients will receive a notification from once it is their turn to visit the ED. They will also be able to update their symptoms and remove themselves from the queue if their symptoms are not critical or require urgent medical attention.

The Online Health Professionals, or as they are called here, Online Nurses, are primarily responsible for triaging patients based on their symptoms and relevant medical history. After they have logged in they will be able to pick a patient from the triage queue and treat their case accordingly by providing directions for them to follow while they wait. The nurse is responsible for sending the patient a notification when it is their turn to visit the ED, however if the patient has been waiting at the front of the queue for more than 15 minutes the system should notify them automatically since the nurses are likely too busy. The nurse is also able to escalate the patient to an emergency First Responder should the patient's condition be severe enough, which will provide them with the patient's symptoms and medical history before they arrive.

The In-Person Medical Professionals, which will be called Healthcare Professionals, represent the doctors or nurses that work in the ED. They will be able to view the patient's symptoms and medical history when they are in the queue, and will also be able to add patients to the ED queue when new patients walk into the ED. When conducting in-person evaluations the nurses and doctors will first assign the patient from the queue to themselves, thus removing them from the queue and updating it. Since the physical evaluation by the professional will be more accurate than the online-triage version, they will be able to update the triage report and also submit the patient's medical report once they are discharged.

In the event that a patient's symptoms are severe enough the Online Nurse will be able to escalate the patient to First Responder's care and they will be notified instantly. The First Responders will be able to view the patient's triage report ahead of time and reach out to establish contact with them to check-in with the patient and gather any additional information. Should the First Responders determine they need to physically assist the patient, MisterED will provide the First Responders with the patient's GPS location and check ED wait times so they can determine which ED to transport the patient to. They will also be able to modify the patient's triage report with more accurate triage reports and notify the ED nurses and doctors ahead of time that they are bringing in a high-priority patient with the updated triage status.

Lastly, the System Administrators will act as the primary actor when it comes to record modification and tech-related support for both Users and Medical Professionals. The Administrators will be in charge of managing User and Employee accounts which includes creating, modifying, or deleting accounts and their permissions. For IT support, Administrators will be able to view service tickets submitted by staff regarding account permissions or other issues they may encounter. This will follow the typical process where they will accept the ticket, communicate with the reporting employee, diagnose and fix the issue / provide a solution, and then close the ticket. Administrators will also be able to modify existing records when Healthcare Professionals submit a record modification. Lastly, one of the most important tasks the Administrators will take on will be regular server updates/maintenance and data backup. The regular server updates will be scheduled during regular system load dips to avoid as much disruption as possible while ensuring that the MisterED system is providing the best possible service to Users/Employees, and the data backups will ensure that User/Employee data is stored securely with no data loss.