In the United States, ambulance response times can vary greatly, depending on region, population density, and government funding. New York City mandates a maximum of 10 minutes to respond to any emergency call. In other, more rural parts of the country, response times can be anywhere from 12 to 15 minutes, or longer, depending on the remoteness of the location. Best practices within the industry dictate an ideal response time of eight minutes.
In business, any system that creates a response time of more than just a few seconds will disappoint customers and reflect badly on any company, especially one that handles real-time data systems. An enterprise service bus (ESB) can take smart data retrieval down to seconds using cached data.
Connected Solutions
In Israel, the concept of first responders has evolved from government employees to a volunteer network. They have integrated the problem of dispersed firehouses and ambulance hubs, and produced a solution to create a lifesaving impact on the community. Businesses can often become nearsighted or settle for problems, rather than looking outside their paradigms for solutions. As was the case in Israel: They had settled for the fact that response times were lengthy, so many people were deeply affected. In order for companies to understand all pieces of a problem, and all possible solutions, they must explore the different combinations with which the problem can be addressed. A business should not settle for a one-size-fits-all solution.
Monitor Real-time Events to Save Lives
An ESB gives businesses the visibility to mange all moving parts within an organization. Let’s apply the ESB to an Israeli ambulance company. The ESB would help dispatchers manage and monitor all volunteer locations based on GPS signals from their cell phones, city traffic, and patient condition. Not only would this assist first responders in saving lives, but would allow them to react to an event almost instantly, instead of paging responders and then checking traffic conditions. The ESB would constantly monitor all events; as soon as the dispatcher entered an event into the system, the ESB would deliver the information—who to contact, where the traffic is, and who or what will be treated—to the dispatcher.
In this case, integration is saving lives. Even if your company isn’t in the business of directly saving lives, you can still benefit from ESB by ensuring relevant roadblocks are addressed and mitigated ahead of time to ensure no time is lost as real-time events unfold. Check out the Integration Maturity to Model to evaluate your company’s strategy.
