System and method for hazardous incident decision support and training

• US 20060085367A1
• Filed: 02/12/2001
• Published: 04/20/2006
• Est. Priority Date: 02/23/2000
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: United States Of America As Represented By The Secretary Of The Army (Government of the United States of America)
• Original Assignee: United States Of America As Represented By The Secretary Of The Army (Government of the United States of America)
• Inventors: Genovese, James A.
• Granted Patent: US 7,194,395 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 706/44
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/00 Administration; Management
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99945 Object-oriented database structure processing
• CPC Class Codes: Y10S 707/99948 Application of database or data structure, e.g. distributed, multimedia, or image

Abstract

A system and method for providing hazardous incident decision support and training includes a user interface component that receives situation definition data, a hazard assessment component and a decision aid. Decision support advice and decision prompts are presented by the system in response to the situation definition interface and hazard assessment. The hazard assessment and expert advice of the system are updated with elapsed time. In another embodiment of the present invention, graphical user interfaces are provided to display a set of menu entries wherein individual menu entries represent a hazardous incident characteristic. The user may select one or more of the menu entries to create a situation definition. Such definitions may be used, for example, to identify a hazardous agent based upon user-inputted signs and symptoms data.

Claims

1. A method for providing hazardous incident decision support and training, comprising:

acquiring observed signs and symptoms data from a user interface;

acquiring agent characteristic data from records in a database, wherein each records includes data representative of a known hazardous agent; and

performing an initial agent identification by comparing the observed signs and symptoms data acquired from the user interface with the agent characteristic data for each record in the database.

2. The method of claim 1, wherein the comparison of the observed signs and symptoms data with the agent characteristic data for each record in the database, further includes assigning a unit value to each of the observed signs and symptoms data that match the agent characteristic data and performing a summation of the assigned unit values to obtain a relative score for each record in the database

3. The method of claim 2, wherein the comparison of the observed signs and symptoms data with the agent characteristic data for each record in the database, further includes multiplying each assigned unit value by a weight factor before performing the summation of assigned unit values to obtain a relative score.

4. The method of claim 3, wherein the observed signs and symptoms data includes time-to-onset data.

5. The method of claim 4, wherein the comparison of the observed signs and symptoms data with the agent characteristic data for each record in the database, further includes subtracting a value from the relative score for each observed sign and symptom that does not have a match in the corresponding database record.

6. The method of claim 5, further including acquiring sensor input data, and performing an improved agent identification using the acquired sensor data.

7. The method of claim 5, further including acquiring sampling data, and performing an improved agent identification using the acquired sampling data.

8. The method of claim 5, further including providing training information and queries.

9. A method for providing hazardous incident decision support and training, comprising;

acquiring a situation definition from a user interface;

acquiring time data from a clock; and

performing a time-dependent hazard assessment in response to the situation definition and time data, wherein the time-dependent hazard assessment is updated with elapsed time.

10. The method of claim 9, further including acquiring a hazard dose and determining an occupational safety factor as a function of time, wherein the occupational safety factor is determined by integration of the hazard dose over time.

11. The method of claim 10, further including acquiring a safety limit, and performing a comparison of the occupational safety factor with the safety limit.

12. The method of claim 11, further including providing a warning when the occupational safety factor exceeds the safety limit.

13. The method of claim 12, further including acquiring a time limit and operational start time, and maintaining a comparison of the operational elapsed time with the time limit wherein the operational elapsed time is determined as the difference between the time acquired from the clock and the operational start time.

14. The method of claim 13, further including providing a warning when the operational time exceeds the time limit.

15. The method of claim 14, further including providing training information and queries.

16. A system for providing hazardous incident decision support and training, comprising:

a user interface component operative to receive a situation definition;

a clock; and

a time-dependent hazard assessment component responsive to the situation definition and clock.

17. The system of claim 16, wherein the user interface component is operative to received observed signs and symptoms data.

18. The system of claim 17, wherein the time-dependent hazard assessment component includes a database of signs and symptoms representative of known agents, and a comparator operative to compare the observed signs and symptoms data obtained from the user interface with the database of signs and symptoms representative of known agents.

19. The system of claim 18, further comprising a sensor for obtaining agent detection data, an input means for obtaining sampling data, and an agent identification component responsive to the sensor and input means for performing an agent identification.

20. The system of claim 19, further including a hazard source assessment responsive to the agent identification component for providing concentration versus time predictive data.

21. The system of claim 20, further including a decision aid component operative to provide decision advice and decision prompts in response to the situation definition and time-dependent hazard assessment, wherein decision data are obtain through user response to the decision prompts.

22. The system of claim 21, further including a training component response to the user interface component, clock, and time-dependent hazard assessment component.

23-42. -42. (canceled)