To support learning, evaluations of crisis management efforts must be effective and lead to actionable recommendations that are implemented. However, little is known regarding what approaches are currently employed to evaluate crisis management efforts, the degree of implementation of recommendations, or if certain approaches are associated with a higher degree of implementation. This study explored these areas by analysing 24 evaluation reports from a Swedish regional public healthcare organisation and examining the implementation status of the presented recommendations.

The analysis of the evaluation reports showed that evaluations can be improved in terms of methodology and presentation, for example, by providing arguments for methodological choices and more clearly stating the purpose of evaluations.

A focus group categorised all 202 recommendations from the analysed evaluation reports to assess their implementation. The results showed that 28 % of the recommendations had been implemented with a clear connection to a specific evaluation, while 45 % were implemented with an unclear connection. Only 12 % were categorised as unimplemented, and 15 % were categorised as unknown. This suggests that evaluations of crisis management efforts have an impact. However, questions regarding their direct impact remain, given that most recommendations were categorised as implemented with unclear connections to specific evaluations.

Combining the results from the analysis of the evaluation reports with the categorisations by the focus group showed that including stakeholders in evaluations and providing arguments for why recommendations should be implemented can increase the direct impact of evaluations of crisis management efforts.

This study investigates drivers’ eye gaze behavior in response to Emergency Vehicle Approaching (EVA) warnings. EVA warnings, delivered through in-car alerts, provide advance notice of approaching EVs, enabling drivers to move over in time. Previous research indicates that EVA warnings influence driver behavior positively, promoting safer interactions. This study expands further by exploring the role of system introduction to make drivers benefit from EVA warnings. A simulator experiment with 73 participants was conducted. Before driving, half of the participants were introduced to the EVA system. The participants were driving on a highway and were overtaken by EVs twice during a 20-minute drive. During the drive, half of participants received EVA warnings. Gaze distribution was analyzed in three areas of interest (Forward, Mirrors, Dashboards). Analysis of driving simulator data did not reveal any differences in driving behaviors. However, the analysis of drivers’ gaze distribution suggests that EVA warnings contribute to increased mirror usage, indicating early scanning for approaching EVs. Furthermore, drivers who were introduced to the EVA system before driving but never received an EVA warning in the simulator looked through the front windshield less than drivers who were introduced and received an EVA warning. This study contributes to understanding the driver gaze behavior when receiving an in-car warning for emergency vehicles and supports previous findings regarding EVA warnings positive impact of driver behavior.

The current study explores immediate responders’ experience of collaboration in first aid. A preliminarydeductive content analysis of ten interviews showed three themes connecting the immediate respondersexperience of collaboration with theoretical teamwork constructs. Future work will investigate theexperience of specific teamwork constructs in the entire interview material.

Emergency vehicle lightings (EVL) mitigate the risk of collision and make drivers move over. The present paper explored how new alternative EVL designs can improve driver behavior in different emergency vehicle interaction scenarios. From workshops with 14 emergency responders, three scenarios (Emergency driving, Police pull-over, Emergency vehicle alongside the road) and 19 EVL blink patterns were chosen. These alternative EVLs were presented in an online survey with 2627 Swedish respondents. Alternative EVL affected reported driving behavior. Drivers reported being most certain of what is expected from them in the emergency-driving scenario. It is important to ensure that the EVL is easy to interpret in more unfamiliar emergency-vehicle interactions such as police pull-over. Only a third of drivers had seen the pull-over EVL currently used in Sweden. The current pull-over EVL in combination with a stop sign increased the chance of drivers reporting that they would pull over.

The interaction between emergency vehicle drivers and surrounding road users is associated with risks. This study explored the application of geofencing to improve interactions between drivers and emergency vehicles to reduce the risk of collisions in high-risk scenarios. Two high-risk scenarios, an off-ramp collision, and an intersection scenario, were used in two driving simulator experiments with 64 participants in total. Half of the drivers received a geofence-based warning about the upcoming traffic situation. The results indicate that geofencing, when applied to provide warnings in specific locations, improves driver behavior. In the off-ramp experiment, all drivers who received a warning avoided the off-ramp and thereby avoided the collision site, whereas all other drivers took the off-ramp. In the intersection experiment, the warning led to earlier deceleration, allowing the emergency vehicle to pass safely and with minimal delay; whereas nearly half of those who did not get a warning failed to yield to the emergency vehicle. The drivers acted based on the warning they received, even when they had not yet seen the emergency vehicle. The findings suggest that geofencing can improve driver behavior by detecting emergency vehicles early and reliably, thereby improving traffic safety and minimizing delay for emergency vehicles on call.

Emergency driving is a demanding task. The ITS service Emergency Vehicle Approaching provides drivers with an in-car warning that an emergency vehicle is approaching. To ensure that the warning is efficient and reliable it must have a suitable timing. The EVA warning must be presented early enough to allow the driver to make a safe move-over maneuver. However, the distribution of EVA warnings is based on the most probable path of the emergency vehicle. If an EVA warning is distributed too early, it increases the risk of false alarms. In addition, if a warning is given too early the driver might deem it as irrelevant.

Previous studies have distributed EVA warnings based on the distance between the emergency vehicle and surrounding cars. However, if the speed of the vehicle is not accounted for there is a risk of insufficient time for the driver to prepare for the emergency vehicle interaction. To explore suitable EVA timing, post-survey data from five driving simulator studies where drivers were exposed to EVA warnings were analyzed. The results suggest that 15–20 seconds could be an appropriate EVA timing. However, the required time for a move-over maneuver depends on the complexity of the current traffic situation.

When an accident has occurred, first aid before a professional response arrives can improve the outcome for the victims. However, little research has been done on the effect of coordination and leadership on first aid responses. This work-in-progress study reports an experiment using a simulated scenario, i.e. traffic accident, to understand the effect of coordination and leadership on first aid performance in ad-hoc groups of immediate responders. The results showed that coordination and leadership are significantly related to increased self-evaluated team performance while expertise and authority differentiation is not. These results provide a first insight to the coordination and leadership in ad-hoc groups of immediate responders, but more research is needed to validate these results. Structured performance evaluation with subject matter experts is planned as an extension to the present work-in-progress.