UTFacultiesBMSNewsArthur Nazarian wins KHMW Philips Graduation Award for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence in Health Care

Arthur Nazarian wins KHMW Philips Graduation Award for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence in Health Care

The KHMW Young Talent Graduation Awards are given in 12 categories annually, one student nationwide in each category. The awards recognize the scientific quality and innovative character of the graduation thesis, as well as the overall achievements of the candidates during their studies. Former IEM Master student Arthur Nazarian, supervised by Dr. Derya Demirtas and Prof.Dr. Johann Hurink, won this year’s KHMW Philips Graduation Award for Data Science and Artificial Intelligence in Health Care. In addition to the prestigious recognition, he will receive €3000 from the Royal Dutch Society of Sciences.

About the thesis and its contribution:
Arthur’s thesis Optimizing the Deployment of Automated External Defibrillators by a Data-Driven Algorithmic Approach” focuses on location of public access automated external defibrillators (AEDs) using an algorithmic approach. In this thesis, Arthur develops a comprehensive prescriptive optimization framework that guides the deployment of AEDs. His methodology accounts for the uncertainty of future cardiac arrest locations and provides an efficient method of creating candidate AED locations. In fact, this is the first study to use dynamic candidate location creation in AED deployment, and is noteworthy for combining data science and facility location in healthcare successfully. Arthur applied his methodology to the actual cardiac arrest and AED data from North Holland and Twente regions in the Netherlands. He showed that by relocating existing AEDs in 43 municipalities in the study area, the coverage of future cardiac arrests can improve by 73.5%. This translates into shorter response times and improved survival rates for cardiac arrest victims.

The award ceremony will take place at the monumental Hodshon Huis in Haarlem on November 26th.