Jameel Institute at Imperial College London launches new tool to help hospitals manage pandemic capacity

• The Abdul Latif Jameel Institute for Disease and Emergency Analytics at Imperial College London has launched a new digital tool to help hospitals around the world manage capacity more effectively

With countries across the world strengthening hospitals’ response to the surge in patients requiring critical care during the COVID-19 crisis, the Abdul Latif Jameel Institute for Disease and Emergency Analytics (J-IDEA) at Imperial College London has launched a new digital tool that helps hospitals and public health services manage critical capacity more effectively, enabling them to meet the increased demand.

Developed by researchers from the Jameel Institute, the tool – called the J-IDEA Pandemic Hospital Planner – can calculate the capacity of beds, staff and ventilator equipment when implementing a number of healthcare provision interventions, such as cancelling elective surgeries and converting operating theatres to critical care wards. The planner also allows hospital management to calculate the number of additional staff members required to fully operationalise additional beds, including if upskilling and reskilling workers and deploying newly qualified and final year medical students are required.

Dr Katharina Hauck, Deputy Director of the Jameel Institute, who led the work, said: “Some countries are facing a surge in patients requiring urgent life-saving care. The J-IDEA pandemic hospital planner gives practical support to decision makers in preparing hospitals for this difficult task, so they can hopefully save as many lives as possible with the given resources.”

The planner is publicly available for health services around the world, and is interactive and adaptable to different and changing circumstances and newly emerging evidence. Hospital managers can access the tool via the Jameel Institute website.