Press release

AP-HP and Inria launch URGE, a research project aimed at analysing and optimising patient visits to A&E

Date:
Changed on 21/02/2023
Based at their joint Daniel Bernoulli laboratory, AP-HP (the university hospital trust operating in Paris and its surroundings) and Inria are coordinating a research project aimed at optimising the treatment of patients at accident and emergency departments. URGE is coordinated by Youri Yordanov (AP-HP, the University Hospital Federation IMPEC and Sorbonne University) and Xavier Allamigeon (Inria and the École Polytechnique), and is aimed at creating a simulator of patient flows in accident and emergency departments, the goal being to assist hospital staff in looking after patients.

Accelerating the transfer of innovations to the hospital sector through a collaborative dynamic

Having worked closely together for a number of years, Inria and AP-HP strengthened their partnership in late 2020 by setting up the joint Daniel Bernoulli laboratory, the aim of which is to bring experts from the two institutions closer together. Focusing on digital science applied to medicine and health, its aim is to promote joint initiatives involving experts from the two institutions in order to stimulate research and to accelerate the transfer of innovations to the hospital sector.

In April 2022, through their joint Daniel Bernoulli laboratory, AP-HP and Inria launched a call for proposals for a major collaborative research project in the field of digital health: “The Bernoulli Lab Joint Challenge”. Following a two-stage selection process (two projects were initially selected from the 7 filed on the basis of letters of intent, before the winning project was chosen on 5 July 2022 by a multidisciplinary AP-HP - Inria panel),1 URGE was announced as the winner of the Bernoulli Lab Joint Challenge and officially launched on 10 October.

Analysing and optimising patient visits to A&E

Visits to accident and emergency departments have nearly doubled over the past 20 years, rising above 20 million annual visits in recent years.

Verbatim

What makes URGE such an original project is that it takes strengths and data from several accident and emergency departments in Ile-de-France, brought together through the university hospital federation, and combines them with the expertise in digital science of Inria's research teams. How patient flows are processed has long been a key to how hospital accident and emergency departments operate. By taking a data-driven approach, we have a project which could have real impact. The partnership between AP-HP and Inria, which has already resulted in the creation of 2 research chairs and which was strengthened through the creation of the Bernoulli Lab, continues to flourish, opening up promising new opportunities for hospitals.

Auteur

Pr Catherine Paugam-Burtz

Poste

Deputy managing director of AP-HP

The use of advanced digital tools such as mathematical modelling and visualisation, combined with data from twelve AP-HP accident and emergency departments, will make it possible to carry out a detailed analysis of patient visits in order to identify stages where things slow down. URGE has three objectives:

  • to develop a tool for simulating flows within accident and emergency departments that is both generic and customisable, with high levels of trust
  • to test different organisational methods, adaptations or solutions within an environment where patients aren't at any risk
  • to back up the opinions of experts with results objectified using mathematical analysis, beginning when patients enter accident and emergency.
Verbatim

The way in which medicine is coming together with digital science and technology is revolutionising the processing of health data. A number of illustrations of this can be seen in the collaboration between Inria and AP-HP, which has been further strengthened through the recent creation of the Bernoulli Lab. URGE is very much in keeping with this dynamic, taking on the difficult issue of how accident and emergency departments are run and employing radical new methodological approaches, which it is hoped will have benefits for patients and healthcare professionals alike. 

Auteur

Jean-Frédéric Gerbeau

Poste

Inria Deputy CEO for Science

URGE is centred around the expertise of professionals from the two institutions, through a collaboration between the university hospital federation IMPEC’s (IMProving Emergency Care2) accident and emergency departments in Ile-de-France, the Est Parisien research platform, the Regional Observatory for Emergency Treatment, and a number of Inria project teams: Tropical (a joint undertaking involving the École Polytechnique IPP and the CNRS, at the Inria Saclay Centre), Aviz (a joint undertaking involving Paris-Saclay University and the CNRS, at the Inria Saclay centre) and Dyogene (a joint undertaking with the ENS PSL and the CNRS, at the Inria Paris centre).  


[1] Composition of the Bernoulli Lab Challenge jury: President of the Coordination Committee (Pr Catherine Paugam-Burtz), Scientific Director of the Bernoulli Lab (Dominique Chapelle), VP Research of the AP-HP (Pr Gabriel Steg), a representative of the AP-HP ISD, a representative of the AP-HP DRCI, a representative of Inria's DGDS (scientific directorate), a representative of Inria's DGDI (innovation directorate)

[2] AP-HP: Ambroise-Paré, Antoine-Béclère, Avicenne, Beaujon, Bicêtre, Bichat, Cochin-Port Royal, Hôpital Européen Georges Pompidou, Henri-Mondor, Jean-Verdier, Lariboisière, Louis-Mourier, Pitié-Salpêtrière, Saint-Antoine, Saint-Louis, and Tenon AP-HP
Outside AP-HP: Saint-Denis, Saint-Joseph, Melun

Download the press release (in French)