Communication Bandwidth Considerations for Exploration Medical Care During Space Missions

Destinations beyond low Earth orbit, especially Mars, have several important constraints, including limited resupply, limited to no possibility of medical evacuation, and delayed communication with ground support teams. Therefore, medical care is driven towards greater autonomy and necessitates a medical system that supports this paradigm, including the potential for high medical data transfer rates in order to share medical information and coordinate care with the ground in an intermittent fashion as communication allows. The medical data transfer needs for a Martian exploration mission were estimated by defining two medical scenarios that would require high data rate communications between the spacecraft and Earth. One medical scenario involves a case of hydronephrosis (outflow obstruction of the kidney) that evolves into pyelonephritis (kidney infection), then urosepsis (systemic infection originating from the kidney), due to obstruction by a kidney stone. A second medical scenario involved the death of a crewmembers child back on Earth that requires behavioral health care. For each of these scenarios, a data communications timeline was created following the medical care described by the scenario. From these timelines, total medical data transfers and burst transmission rates were estimated. Total data transferred from the vehicle-to-ground were estimated to be 94 gigabytes (GB) and 835 GB for the hydronephrosis and behavioral health scenarios, respectively. Data burst rates were estimated to be 7.7 megabytes per second (MB/s) and 15 MB/s for the hydronephrosis and behavioral health scenarios, respectively. Even though any crewed Mars mission should be capable of functioning autonomously, as long as the possibility of communication between Earth and Mars exists, Earth-based subject matter experts will be relied upon to augment mission medical capability. Therefore, setting an upper boundary limit for medical communication rates can help factor medical system needs into total vehicle communication requirements

NASA Spine Workshop

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Development of an Accepted Medical Condition List for Mars Transit Medical Capability Scoping

No abstract availabl

Open Doors and Online Services: A Collaborative Response to the COVID-19 Pandemic

During the COVID-19 pandemic, libraries needed to abruptly and iteratively adjust operations to safeguard library employees while continuing to support the students, faculty, and researchers we serve. At the UC Davis Library (comprising the Peter J. Shields Library in Davis, the Carlson Health Sciences Library in Davis, and the Blaisdell Medical Library in Sacramento), our Library Response Team, a standing group focused on emergency preparedness and response, collaborated to redesign our spaces and services in order to remain available to UC Davis students and employees throughout the pandemic. This panel presentation will highlight lessons learned, including what we would have done differently and what went so well we plan to continue it into the coming year. Specific aspects of this work include: ● Alignment with rapidly changing and often ambiguous or conflicting national, state, local, and campus guidance regarding health and safety ● Establishment of key principles that remain relevant as conditions change ● Iterative scenario planning and constant communication within the library and with campus ● Specific operational issues around entry-point access, rearranging study space, how to provide services and collections access, and how to communicate change through signage and digital channels Panelists will also share perspectives on how strategies honed through the Library Response Team’s prior experience working together in other emergency response situations laid a foundation for success during the pandemic. The session will include time for Q&A with panelists, as well as to connect with colleagues interested in leading libraries through unforeseen future events