One2many, an Everbridge company, brings the Alerting Cell Broadcast Center Function (CBCF) developed in the FUDGE-5G project and the Alerting Prototype Chatbot developed in the ENGAGE project together. Both are Research Grants enabled by the European Union Horizon 2020 program, from different work programs.

CBCF in FUDGE-5G

One2many develops the Cell Broadcast Centre Function (CBCF) as a cloud-native system under the FUDGE-5G project.
The key focus of the FUDGE-5G project efforts will be to enable highly customized alert and notification functions for industry-specific verticals in a 5G environment.  The cloud-native deployment of CBCF on private 5G networks will help realizing vertical use cases as pure cloud-based applications.

How does CBCF in FUDGE-5G work?

Similarly, to the broadcasting of nation-wide public alerting messages over mobile networks to reach 99% of the population of an emergency-hit area, CBCF in FUDGE 5G will allow broadcasting of informational messages (e.g., coordination, warning, deployment, or any other) over the private 5G network to all mobile devices in an area. Such CB messages may contain a link for the user to obtain more information in an automated and expedited manner. This additional information will be provided by a chatbot.

Chatbot in Project-ENGAGE

One2many develops a chatbot under the ENGAGE project. The project partners worked in synergy uniting academic and practitioner expertise. This led to the concretization in a technology-ready prototype, of a blueprint study.
The chatbot blueprint is a thorough piece of comparative research of 45 chatbot types and functionalities applied in a variety of cultural and societal settings. The chatbot prototype is a machine-learning module, based on the blueprint specifications, and interoperating within a Cell Broadcast (CB) public warning environment to reduce the congestion or the overload of emergency response centers when an emergency happens.

How does the Alerting Prototype Chatbot work in Project-ENGAGE?

When an emergency happens, and the 112 number or other emergency response center is unable to respond to queries due to the surge in call volume, the chatbot link clearly communicated in the CB message will allow the population to access to relevant safety information otherwise unavailable. Standard questions such as “what happens?”, “which direction to evacuate?”, “how distant is the accident?” among numerous others are elaborated through advanced machine learning and natural language generation (NLG).

Applying research to a real use case: The hospital case

Sara is a doctor in a modern hospital in an area endowed with 5G connectivity and a private 5G network. As a doctor, she is providing remote consultations, coordinating her medical support team on the wards, reporting to the direction on the needs for new equipment, or the depletion of stocks. Suddenly, she realizes that the inflow of patients needing enriched-oxygen treatment has increased and her ward is falling short of devices, of beds, and of medical support personnel. Her team is unable to address the surge in demand for assistance, and she the remote consultations, leaving patients in need unattended and exposed to life-threatening risk. This is a potential emergency. How can she inform rapidly and effectively the hospital management to intervene and reduce the risks she is foreseeing?
With the synergic technologies developed under Horizon 2020 projects, Sara will be able to notify the hospital management. The latter to define a response strategy and use the Everbridge Public Warning Center (PWC) to send an informational message (e.g., a warning message) to the CBCF which, in a few seconds, will disseminates the message to all hospital staff in the impacted area/ function via the private 5G network. The PWC will also send simultaneously information about the event to the chatbot server, for helping to address the surge in inquiries the hospital staff may be having. The message that medical staff receive on their mobile device will contains a web link to the chatbot sever. The chatbot server will have been configured to provide several answers to questions the hospital staff may have as a reaction to the message received, reducing the surge in calls to hospital management while guiding the staff on what to do and how to do it.
CBCF and Chatbot Innovations will allow hospital staff to work more efficiently and effectively, by facilitating the distribution of medical knowledge, relevant information, and expertise over a much wider area in a much faster time. This innovations in terms of network connectivity, IT security, and automation expands the hospital capabilities, enables to mobilize more doctors to respond to remote consultations, to redeploy wards from one use (e.g. orthopedics)  to another (e.g. respiratory emergency), to monitor the supply of oxygen-treatment machines, and to evaluate how the emergency is evolving. All this, over a broad geographical coverage (hospital buildings over an extended area, such as a region, or a large capital city).
This process of office digitalization is expected to generate operational efficiencies and productivity improvements while ensuring the maximum security and privacy offered by a private network.

Author: Peter Sanders – one2many (an Everbridge company)
Reviewer: Rachele Gianfranchi, Jessica Finn
 

This work was supported in part by the European Commission under the 5G-PPP project FUDGE-5G (H2020-ICT-42-2020 call, grant number 957242). The views expressed in this contribution are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the project.