Identifying the Critical Golden Hour Zones in Rural Kansas

The Golden-Hour is a term used in emergency medicine to describe the first hour after a traumatic vehicle crash injury when there is the greatest chance of survival through quick medical intervention. The most frequent cause of mortality for those receiving emergency medical care on the side of the road is blood loss, primarily because of failing to administer the life-saving therapy right away. This shows how important it is for institutions to be ready and backed by an emergency response system. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) reports that approximately 36% of fatal crashes in rural areas had response times greater than 60 minutes. In contrast, only 10% of fatal crashes in urban areas go beyond the 60-minute threshold. Therefore, improving the time required for rural service providers in post-crash scenarios is critical. The primary goal is to enable the emergency responders to have a faster travel time without any incidence. Studies show that the crash fatality rate for EMS vehicles per mile traveled is about 10 times higher than that for heavy trucks. Out of 140,372 roadway centerline miles in Kansas, over 126,000 miles are in rural areas. Identifying and locating the critical Golden-Hour zones in rural Kansas is important. A critical Golden-Hour zone is defined as a geo-fenced area where post-crash care service arrival will exceed 60-minutes. Further, geo-spatial mapping—location of trauma centers, fire/emergency services, and potential crash locations—is needed to find strategies to reduce response times and potential investment directions—training, technologies, and positioning of the services. The proposed research will: (A) Identify and map the critical Golden-Hour zones in rural Kansas using geographic information systems (GIS) data of trauma centers (and post-crash services in general) and historical (2010- 2019) crash location data (see example mapping in appendix). We will also consider the location airports (possibility of air-ambulance). (B) Develop travel time matrices using publicly available traffic flow data—HPMS based AADT, and INRIX database. (C) Develop recommendations for multi-agencies that will complete the current Strategic Highway Safety Plan—a map of critical zones and potential strategies (e.g., spatial repositioning, technology) to improve the response time.

Language

• English

Project

• Status: Active
• Funding: $68775
• Contract Numbers:

  RE-0874-01

  K-TRAN: KSU-24-1

  C2223

• Sponsor Organizations:

  Kansas Department of Transportation

  Eisenhower State Office Building
  700 SW Harrison Street
  Topeka, KS  United States  66603-3754
• Performing Organizations:

  Kansas State University Transportation Center

  Kansas State University
  Department of Civil Engineering
  Manhattan, KS  United States  66506
• Principal Investigators:

  Aziz, Husain

• Start Date: 20230901
• Expected Completion Date: 20241231
• Actual Completion Date: 0

Subject/Index Terms

• TRT Terms: Emergency medical services; Emergency response time; Fatalities; First responders; Geographic information systems; Location data; Rural areas; Rural highways; State departments of transportation
• Geographic Terms: Kansas
• Subject Areas: Data and Information Technology; Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Safety and Human Factors; Security and Emergencies;

Filing Info

• Accession Number: 01894615
• Record Type: Research project
• Source Agency: Kansas Department of Transportation
• Contract Numbers: RE-0874-01, K-TRAN: KSU-24-1, C2223
• Files: RIP, STATEDOT
• Created Date: Sep 26 2023 2:04PM