An Evaluation of the Drone Delivery of Adrenaline Auto-Injectors for Anaphylaxis: Pharmacists’ Perceptions, Acceptance, and Concerns

Risks of Drone Use in Light of Literature Studies

This article aims to present the results of a bibliometric analysis of relevant literature and discuss the main research streams related to the topic of risks in drone applications. The methodology of the conducted research consisted of five procedural steps, including the planning of the research, conducting a systematic review of the literature, proposing a classification framework corresponding to contemporary research trends related to the risk of drone applications, and compiling the characteristics of the publications assigned to each of the highlighted thematic groups. This systematic literature review used the PRISMA method. A total of 257 documents comprising articles and conference proceedings were analysed. On this basis, eight thematic categories related to the use of drones and the risks associated with their operation were distinguished. Due to the high content within two of these categories, a further division into subcategories was proposed to illustrate the research topics better. The conducted investigation made it possible to identify the current research trends related to the risk of drone use and pointed out the existing research gaps, both in the area of risk assessment methodology and in its application areas. The results obtained from the analysis can provide interesting material for both industry and academia.

Survey on Path Planning for UAVs in Healthcare Missions

This article presents a comprehensive review of the state-of-the-art applications and methodologies related to the use of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) in the healthcare sector, with a particular focus on path planning. UAVs have gained remarkable attention in healthcare during the outbreak of COVID-19, and this study explores their potential as a viable option for medical transportation. The survey categorizes existing studies by mission type, challenges addressed, and performance metrics to provide a clearer picture of the path planning problems and potential directions for future research. It highlights the importance of addressing the path planning problem and the challenges that UAVs may face during their missions, including the UAV delivery range limitation, and discusses recent solutions in this field. The study concludes by encouraging researchers to conduct their studies in a realistic environment to reveal UAVs' real potential, usability, and feasibility in the healthcare domain.

Current summary of the evidence in drone-based emergency medical services care

Interventions for many medical emergencies including cardiac arrests, strokes, drug overdoses, seizures, and trauma, are critically time-dependent, with faster intervention leading to improved patient outcomes. Consequently, a major focus of emergency medical services (EMS) systems and prehospital medicine has been improving the time until medical intervention in these time-sensitive emergencies, often by reducing the time required to deliver critical medical supplies to the scene of the emergency. Medical indications for using unmanned aerial vehicles, or drones, are rapidly expanding, including the delivery of time-sensitive medical supplies. To date, the drone-based delivery of a variety of time-critical medical supplies has been evaluated, generating promising data suggesting that drones can improve the time interval to intervention through the rapid delivery of automatic external defibrillators (AEDs), naloxone, antiepileptics, and blood products. Furthermore, the improvement in the time until intervention offered by drones in out-of-hospital emergencies is likely to improve patient outcomes in time-dependent medical emergencies. However, barriers and knowledge gaps remain that must be addressed. Further research demonstrating functionality in real-world scenarios, as well as research that integrates drones into the existing EMS structure will be necessary before drones can reach their full potential. The primary aim of this review is to summarize the current evidence in drone-based Emergency Medical Services Care to help identify future research directions.

Optimization of Medication Delivery Drone with IoT-Guidance Landing System Based on Direction and Intensity of Light

This paper presents an optimization of the medication delivery drone with the Internet of Things (IoT)-Guidance Landing System based on direction and intensity of light. The IoT-GLS was incorporated into the system to assist the drone’s operator or autonomous system to select the best landing angles for landing. The landing selection was based on the direction and intensity of the light. The medication delivery drone system was developed using an Arduino Uno microcontroller board, ESP32 DevKitC V4 board, multiple sensors, and IoT mobile apps to optimize face detection. This system can detect and compare real-time light intensity from all directions. The results showed that the IoT-GLS has improved the distance of detection by 192% in a dark environment and exhibited an improvement in face detection distance up to 147 cm in a room with low light intensity. Furthermore, a significant correlation was found between face recognition’s detection distance, light source direction, light intensity, and light color (p < 0.05). The findings of an optimal efficiency of facial recognition for medication delivery was achieved due to the ability of the IoT-GLS to select the best angle of landing based on the light direction and intensity.

Drone Usage for Medicine and Vaccine Delivery during the COVID-19 Pandemic: Attitude of Health Care Workers in Rural Medical Centres

Rural areas are often difficult to access reliably with medicine and vaccines. This study aimed to examine rural health care workers’ attitude towards drone delivery for medicine and vaccines and the factors that influenced it. Health care workers from four rural health care facilities were sampled. Participants self-reported their demographic information, attitude towards medicine and vaccine delivery using drones, perception of benefits and risks of using drones, and perceived leadership innovativeness through an online or a pen-and-paper questionnaire. A total of 272 health care workers (mean age = 36.19, SD = 8.10) from all of the sites participated in this study. More than half of the study participants agreed or strongly agreed that using a drone to deliver medicine and vaccines is a good idea (54.2%, 95% CI [47.5, 60.8]), a wise idea (54.6%, 95% CI [47.9, 61.2]), and is desirable (52.5%, 95% CI [45.7, 59.0]). Males (β = 0.223), workers from the Obstetrics and Gynaecology department (β = 0.135), a lower perceived delivery risk (β = −0.237), and higher leadership innovativeness (β = 0.336) predicted positive attitudes towards drone usage. Assistant medical officers (β = −0.172) had a negative attitude. There is a need to further understand the roles of occupation and leadership innovativeness in predicting health care workers’ attitude towards drone usage, as these differences could be embedded within their roles in the health care system.

Design of a Service for Hospital Internal Transport of Urgent Pharmaceuticals via Drones

The internal transport of medical goods in a hospital heavily relies on human resources that carry the materials on foot. Such mode of transport may be affected by inefficiencies, e.g., due to bottlenecks, and other logistic challenges. Thus, it may benefit from the use of unmanned aircraft systems in several aspects. Such a scenario introduces specific criticalities for healthcare organizations in densely populated areas and below congested airspace, such as the Milan metropolitan area. The authors applied a co-creation methodology to design a highly automated drone service for the delivery of pharmaceuticals at San Raffaele Hospital, Milan, Italy. The needs of the main users were identified by means of semi-structured interviews and visualization material. Based on those outcomes, a drone service was designed and validated with the main users. It emerged that the main gain point of such a service would be increasing hospital logistics efficiency. The risks tied to the operations (e.g., tampering of the delivery container) were evaluated and appropriate mitigations were identified (e.g., use of tamper-evident seals or mechatronic locks). The information required by the digital system offering the needed logistics functions was analyzed for future development. Recent conceptual and regulatory advancements in the field of Urban Air Mobility (UAM) in Europe were elaborated to outline the digital ecosystem in which aviation and non-aviation actors would exchange information to ensure operations’ efficiency, safety and regulatory compliance.

Enabling Safe and Sustainable Medical Deliveries by Connected Autonomous Freight Vehicles Operating within Dangerous Goods Regulations

Health service providers in developed nations are responsible for 5% of their national carbon emissions, much of which originate from transport and supply chains. Connected autonomous freight vehicles (CAV-Fs) offer the potential to reduce this impact and enable lower cost operations, with trials being explored across the world. Transportation and carriage regulations, particularly in relation to the movement of dangerous goods (DG) such as medicines and diagnostic specimens, have not been developed for and applied to this new transport mode, particularly where loads are unaccompanied. Through an audit of current legislation and practice, this paper evaluates current DGs regulations applied to the transportation of medical products and medicines by autonomous road vehicles. Where existing regulations are not appropriate for CAV-Fs, recommendations and adaptations have been proposed to support safe and practical application. Remote monitoring and tracking of vehicles are critical for ensuring load security, quick and effective incident response, and management of documents and communications between parties. Loading/unloading procedures are significantly more important than in crewed vehicles, with load segregation and recording of all activity being of key importance. Other recommendations relate to training provision, vehicle specifications, and product health monitoring.

Impact of Using Drones in Emergency Medicine: What Does the Future Hold?

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles or "drones" has expanded in the last decade, as their technology has become more sophisticated, and costs have decreased. They are now used routinely in farming, environmental surveillance, public safety, commercial product delivery, recreation, and other applications. Health-related applications are only recently becoming more widely explored and accepted. The use of drone technology in emergency medicine is especially promising given the need for a rapid response to enhance patient outcomes. The purpose of this paper is to describe some of the main current and expanding applications of drone technology in emergency medicine and to describe challenges and future opportunities. Current applications being studied include delivery of defibrillators in response to out-of-hospital cardiac arrest, blood and blood products in response to trauma, and rescue medications. Drones are also being studied and actively used in emergency response to search and rescue operations as well as disaster and mass casualty events. Current challenges to expanding their use in emergency medicine and emergency medical system (EMS) include regulation, safety, flying conditions, concerns about privacy, consent, and confidentiality, and details surrounding the development, operation, and maintenance of a medical drone network. Future research is needed to better understand end user perceptions and acceptance. Continued technical advances are needed to increase payload capacities, increase flying distances, and integrate drone networks into existing 9-1-1 and EMS systems. Drones are a promising technology for improving patient survival, outcomes, and quality of life, particularly for those in areas that are remote or that lack funds or infrastructure. Their cost savings compared with ground transportation alone, speed, and convenience make them particularly applicable in the field of emergency medicine. Research to date suggests that use of drones in emergency medicine is feasible, will be accepted by the public, is cost-effective, and has broad application.

How Do Dangerous Goods Regulations Apply to Uncrewed Aerial Vehicles Transporting Medical Cargos?

Commercial operations of uncrewed aerial vehicles (UAVs or drones) are expanding, with medical logistics using UAVs as part of health service supply chains being targeted. The ability to transport cargos that include items classified as Dangerous Goods (DG) is a significant factor in enabling UAV logistics to assist medical supply chains, but DG regulations for air transport have developed from the perspective of crewed aircraft and not UAVs. This paper provides an important audit of the current DG regulations, best practice in their application and the development of much-needed new governance that will be required to fully exploit UAVs for the safe transport of DG in medical logistics. Findings from the audit provide a summary of the circumstances and potential challenges resulting from the application of DG regulations as they stand to UAV operations, particularly for medical logistics, and convenient guidance on the practical implications of DG regulations for UAV operators. The main conclusion is that this is an under-researched domain, not yet given full consideration in a holistic way by regulators, governments, industry bodies, practitioners or academia.

Quantifying the Effects of Vibration on Medicines in Transit Caused by Fixed-Wing and Multi-Copter Drones

The concept of transporting medical products by drone is gaining a lot of interest amongst the medical and logistics communities. Such innovation has generated several questions, a key one being the potential effects of flight on the stability of medical products. The aims of this study were to quantify the vibration present within drone flight, study its effect on the quality of the medical insulin through live flight trials, and compare the effects of vibration from drone flight with traditional road transport. Three trials took place in which insulin ampoules and mock blood stocks were transported to site and flown using industry standard packaging by a fixed-wing or a multi-copter drone. Triaxial vibration measurements were acquired, both in-flight and during road transit, from which overall levels and frequency spectra were derived. British Pharmacopeia quality tests were undertaken in which the UV spectra of the flown insulin samples were compared to controls of known turbidity. In-flight vibration levels in both the drone types exceeded road induced levels by up to a factor of three, and predominant vibration occurred at significantly higher frequencies. Flown samples gave clear insulin solutions that met the British Pharmacopoeia specification, and no aggregation of insulin was detected.

Operational Study of Drone Spraying Application for the Disinfection of Surfaces against the COVID-19 Pandemic

The COVID-19 pandemic has shown the need to maximize the cleanliness of outside public services and the need to disinfect these areas to reduce the virus transmission. This work evaluates the possibilities of using unmanned aircraft systems for disinfection tasks in these aeras. The operational study focuses on evaluating the static and dynamic behavior, as well as the influence of the flying height, mission speed and flow of spraying. The most recommended height for correct spraying with the drone system under study is 3.0 m. The dynamic test shows that the lower height, 3.0 m, also provides the most adequate spraying footprint, achieving 2.2 m for a speed of 0.5 m/s. The operational behavior is evaluated on three different scenarios, a skatepark with an area around 882.7 m2, an outdoor gym with an area around 545.0 m2 and a multisport court with an area around 2025.7 m2. The cleaning time evaluates the flying duration, battery change and tank refill and results in 41 min for the skatepark (5 tank refills and 2 battery changes), 28.6 min for the outdoor gym (3 tank refills and 2 battery changes) and 96.4 min for the multisport court (11 tank refills and 5 battery changes). Each battery change and each tank refill are estimated to take 4 min each, with a drone autonomy of 7 min. The technology appears competitive compared to other forms of cleaning based, for example, on human operators.