A Study On Determinants Of Rfid Adoption Intention Among Hajj Organizers In Indonesia And Malaysia And Its Strategic Information Systems Plan

Every year, millions of Muslims go to Makkah to perform the Hajj (Pilgrimage). The management of Hajj activities is a very complex task for Saudi Arabian authorities and Hajj organizers because of the large number of pilgrims, the limited geographical area for pilgrim movement, and the short Hajj period. Radio frequency identification (RFID) technology can be used to provide good solutions for the problems and difficulties that arise during Hajj season. However, as an emerging technology, the use of RFID in Hajj management has not been investigated till date. This study develops a theoretical model for RFID adoption intention in Hajj organizations by using the technology–organization–environment framework. Seven independent variables (relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, top management support, organization size, government support, and willingness to collaborate among partners) and one moderator variable (organizational readiness) are proposed to help predict the RFID adoption intention. The variable of willingness to collaborate among partners, which has been ignored in previous Information Systems literature, is included in this study as an important factor in the environmental context. This study empirically tests the proposed model by using an adequate sample size of Hajj organizations. Data collected from 165 Hajj organizers from Indonesia and Malaysia and their Hajj service provider in Saudi Arabia are tested against the proposed research model using hierarchical regression

Predicting Pilgrim and Visitor Satisfaction Through Using Smartphone Applications at Holy Sites During Covid-19

This study aims to investigate the promotion of digital transformation in Umrah and Visitation through the management of smartphone applications (such as Tawakkalna and Nusuk) in light of COVID-19. The research measures the impact of digital transformation on visits during COVID-19, in light of the Kingdom's Vision 2030 statement, in terms of pilgrims’ and visitors’ satisfaction with the services provided in Madinah. The study relied on the descriptive analytical approach to collect and analyse primary and secondary data as the basis for research findings. An electronic questionnaire was designed and distributed to pilgrims and visitors in Madinah. The study found a positive significant impact of digital transformation on visits during COVID-19 in light of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 statement and pilgrims’ and visitors’ satisfaction with the services provided to them. The study recommends that decision-makers and employers emphasize the need to use Smartphone applications in Hajj and Umrah visits even after the end of the Corona crisis. Applications were found to be critically important in limiting the spread of the virus. There is a need for continuous improvements in digital transformation in Hajj, Umrah and visits

An Investigation of IoT Importance and Viability of Health Records Retrieval using Electronic Tags in Pilgrimage

Healthcare services is one of most important domains in the world. One of most crucial aspects of healthcare services is the need to make accurate healthcare decisions at the right time. Retrieving useful historical health records of patients in real-time is necessary to provide accurate healthcare decisions. Traditional health record systems such as paperbased system require time and effort to collect, manage, and retrieve patients’ records. Electronic health record systems were adopted to allow healthcare staff to retrieve useful health records in real-time and consequently improve and speed up healthcare services. Although EHR is effective to serve patients in their local countries, the implementation of EHR for global purposes is still an issue and EHR is not always applicable for people who travel to other countries. One of the most important purposes for Muslims to travel is the pilgrimage journey to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) to perform religious rites. The millions of pilgrims converging there may need healthcare services and these services should be accomplished accurately in real-time which require electronic-based historical health records approaches. This study aims to investigate the importance and viability of IoT implementati ons to support retrieval of pilgrims’ EHR using electronic tags. A questionnaire with 60 academic staff and interview with five experts from KSA were conducted to address the main aim of this study. The significance of the results shows that EHR supporting tag reading is a promising solution to enhance healthcare services and counter the challenges of EHR implementations in pilgrimage

Epidemiology of Hajj Pilgrimage Mortality: Analysis for Potential Intervention

BackgroundThe Hajj is the annual mass gathering of Muslims that occurs in Makkah, Saudi Arabia. The Saudi Vision 2030 predicts the attendance of 30 million pilgrims each year by 2030. Cost-effective healthcare services during the Hajj are important to manage this increase in the number of pilgrims. Communicable diseases have always been a concern during the Hajj. However, little is known about the impact of the preexisting chronic diseases on morbidity and mortality during the Hajj. Furthermore, the quality of services provided by Hajj hospitals warrants further study.ObjectivesA relatively large number of pilgrims admitted to Hajj hospitals die during their stay. This dissertation aims to describe patterns of inpatient, all-cause mortality during the Hajj and the relationship between mortality and preexisting chronic diseases as well as the services provided in Hajj hospitals.Study Design and PopulationThe population included pilgrims who were admitted to Hajj hospitals in Makkah and sacred sites during five Hajj seasons between 2012 and 2017, excluding 2015. A retrospective, matched, case-control study design was utilized with a ratio of deaths to surviving controls of 1:2, resulting in 2,237 cases of mortality being matched to 4,474 control cases based on age and gender using a one-stage sampling approach. The data was extracted from hospital admissions offices and medical records.Methods Preexisting chronic diseases included diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and cardiovascular diseases. Medical services provided by Hajj hospitals included intensive care unit (ICU) admission, intubation, radiology imaging (MRI and CT scan), endoscopy, and blood transfusion. Covariates included individual-level variables (age, gender, nationality, length of stay, mode of admission, discharge diagnosis, and Hajj status) as well as hospital-level variables (hospital location, hospital of discharge, bed-to-doctor ratio, and bed-to-nurse ratio). Hierarchical, logistic regression models were used to examine the medical services. The effect measure modification of the copresence of more than one chronic disease was also examined. For every independent variable that was evaluated, the prevalence, crude and adjusted odds ratios (AORs), and corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs), were calculated.Results The rate of inpatient all-cause mortality was higher in Makkah hospitals compared to sacred site hospitals. Also, inpatient, all-cause mortality was significantly associated with diabetes (AOR: 1.44, 95% CI: 1.27-1.63), hypertension (AOR: 1.34, 95% CI: 1.17-1.53), and cardiovascular diseases (AOR: 1.32, 95% CI: 1.14-1.53). Moreover, effect measure modification was present in the association between diabetes and cardiovascular diseases and the association between hypertension and cardiovascular diseases, but not the association between diabetes and hypertension. Finally, patients who were admitted to the ICU or who received radiology imaging, endoscopy, or blood transfusion were more likely to die during their hospital stay compared to those patients not receiving those services (ICU AOR: 8.00, 95% CI: 7.8-8.2; radiology AOR: 1.60, 95% CI: 0.98-2.60; endoscopy AOR: 1.99, 95% CI: 1.37-2.88; blood transfusion AOR: 4.00, 95% CI: 2.59-6.24). However, the mortality rate was lower in intubated patients compared to nonintubated patients (AOR: 0.54, 95% CI: 0.35-0.82).ConclusionThe current focus on public health issues during the Hajj should be equally distributed between communicable and noncommunicable diseases. Although advanced services are provided by Hajj hospitals, interventions to address the increased risks, including mortality, faced by pilgrims with preexisting, chronic diseases should be further investigated and considered

Crowoding in Mina based on pilgrims’ perception of safety and comfort in Hajj

Crowding perception has been studied in various settings to alleviate the effect of the crowded conditions on participants’ well-being. These include festivals, outdoor recreation, tourism and retail settings. However, very few researches have addressed the crowding perception in religious settings that include a large number of populations such as during the Hajj. More than two million pilgrims perform their Hajj every year. The Hajj process involves staying at the holy site of Mina from four to five days. In Mina, the pilgrims require a peaceful atmosphere to perform their Hajj rituals. A large number of pilgrims and Mina’s spatial constraints led to crowded conditions that affected the pilgrims’ peaceful atmosphere and created serious safety and comfort concerns. It appears that little research consideration has been given to alleviate the impact of the crowded conditions on the pilgrims. Therefore, the research aim is to establish parameters that affect pilgrims’ levels of crowding perception toward enhancing their perception of safety and comfort in Mina during the Hajj. Accordingly, a systematic literature review was employed to develop a conceptual framework that considers the possible influential factors that might affect the pilgrims’ and the effect of their perceived crowding on perceived levels of safety and comfort in Mina. Then, this research used a quantitative research design and data were randomly collected from 1243 pilgrims of seven pilgrim groups representing seven Hajj establishments. The data were analysed using the SPSS and AMOS software. The findings revealed that for all pilgrims, one socio-demographic factor (education), one personal factor (expectation), two social factors (provision of information and activities) and three physical factors (routing strategies, disorientation causes and coding and signage) are observed to have significant impact on the pilgrims’ crowding perception, which significantly affects their levels of perceived safety and comfort in Mina. The findings also indicated that the impact of influential factors on the pilgrims’ crowding perception varies according to their pilgrims’ group. Based on the findings, this research recommended eight parameters that affect the pilgrims’ levels of crowding perception to enhance their levels of perceived safety and comfort in Mina. Furthermore, this thesis suggested some theoretical and practical implications as well as important avenues for future research

Meningococcal vaccination and travel health in Hajj pilgrims – A study of pilgrims to Mecca, Saudi Arabia

Background: Hajj brings millions of pilgrims from different countries into a confined place. A number of outbreaks of meningococcal disease have been reported after the Hajj. All pilgrims are required to receive a quadrivalent meningococcal vaccine at least 10 days before the Hajj. They are also advised to follow travel health advice to reduce the risk of acquiring infections. We conducted a study to investigate the association between time of meningococcal vaccination and carriage of Neisseria meningitidis pathogenic serogroups A, C, W, and Y. Patterns of health problems encountered by pilgrims and preventive measures adopted during the Hajj were also investigated. Methods: A cross-sectional oropharyngeal carriage survey was conducted in 2973 Hajj pilgrims in 2017. A two stage sampling method was used to select departing flights. An electronic data collection tool (‘Open Data Kit’ (ODK)), was used to gather demographic, health and exposure data through questionnaires. Real-time polymerase chain reaction (rt-PCR) was used to identify N. meningitidis and serogroups. Results: The overall prevalence of N. meningitidis carriage was 4·6%. Meningococcal carriage of pathogenic serogroups A, C, W, and Y was not significantly associated with time of vaccination. A total 22·58 % were likely unvaccinated against meningococcal disease. 38.7% reported symptoms of upper respiratory tract infections and 5.4% of travel 4 diarrhoea. Compliance with facemask use was 50.2%. Changing facemask every 4 hours was found to be a significant protective factor for URTI’s. No significant association was found between having a chronic disease and seeking pre-travel advice. Conclusion: Whilst this study did not find any association between timing of meningococcal vaccination and carriage of N. meningitidis, it did highlight the issue of unvaccinated pilgrims and a need to strengthen compliance with the current vaccination policy. Early pre-travel health advice should continue to be enforced

Hajj crowd management via a mobile augmented reality application: a case of The Hajj event, Saudi Arabia

Hajj event is considered as one of the Islamic pillars that each Muslim, who could afford its’ expenses and are well bodied, should perform its’ rituals at least once in a lifetime. Therefore, they could travel to Mecca city, in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia to perform Hajj rituals. This holy city hosts this event annually in the last month of the Arabic calendar, which is Dhul Hijjah, and it lasts for 6 days. In addition, those Muslim visitors or pilgrims are obligated to be accommodated at Hajj ritual places, which are Arafat, Mina and Muzdalifah. However, in the last ten years, it was noticed that the Hajj events are crowded every year. Therefore, Hajj crowd management is being a complex task, due to the huge number of the pilgrims as they are crowded at the Hajj ritual places. This huge number is causing many problems, and Hajj authorities are facing difficulties in managing those crowded pilgrims. As a result, this research focuses on three main problems that occur at Hajj events. First, difficulties in organizing the crowds’ movements of the pilgrims, as Hajj events host enormous number of pilgrims in limited geographical spaces at the ritual places. This problem leads to overcrowdings, congestions and stampedes. Second, the pilgrims could get lost at Hajj ritual places, especially when they are moving between these places. Third, lack of directional information and guidance for those lost pilgrims. This problem leads to difficulties in finding their groups at the ritual sites, because the huge number of the pilgrims. Thus, this research proposes to deploy a technology, such as a Mobile Augmented Reality application. This application would assist the Hajj authorities (staff and operators) in managing the pilgrims’ movements between the ritual places, and to provide directions to the lost pilgrims. In addition, it would help those lost pilgrims by alerting, and sending their location information to their group guide. On the other hand, the research literature review covers previous studies about the Hajj crowd management, as it is divided into two perspectives. The theoretical perspective, which explains the crowd management steps that should be followed and applied, as these steps would help the Hajj authorities to succeed in crowd management at Hajj events. The practical perspective presents some studies that are related to the Hajj events. Those studies offered some solutions to manage crowded pilgrims, to avoid overcrowdings and stampedes, and to identify, locate and guide lost pilgrims. The solutions were Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems, Global Positioning Systems (GPS) deceives and monitoring cameras. In addition, this research conducted and distributed questionnaires on 104 respondents. They were selected as they are related to Hajj events. The results of this research method confirmed that the Hajj events face problems. For example, overcrowdings, congestions and stampedes that occur at the ritual places, due to lack of pilgrims organization in limited spaces at these places. In addition, foreign pilgrims face difficulties in guidance, due to lack of directional information, and they could get lost from their groups at the Hajj events. In addition, the respondents suggested using technology to assist Hajj authorities in Hajj crowd management. Therefore, deploying MAR application is suggested, as a solution to solve or at least reduce the Hajj problems. The proposed application could help the Hajj authorities to manage the crowded pilgrims at the Hajj ritual places as this research illustrates two scenarios in Hajj crowd management. In conclusion, this application is beneficial and significant in crowd management at Hajj events, as it could provide instant information using high-speed process in sending and receiving information. In addition, the information about the pilgrims’ movements could be gathered, presented on smart devices and shared between applications’ users. Those users will be the Hajj staff on the ground and the Hajj operators in the control room of Hajj operations