OPTIVERY

OPTIVERY aims to develop a multi-stop route optimisation algorithm and validate it in a drone-based delivery system for transporting medicines from hospitals to rural healthcare centres.

This project is a response to Galicias healthcare services needs: Galicia’s rural municipalities together account for 35% of the population but cover as much as 86% of the territory (25,433km2). This highly scattered distribution poses great challenges to healthcare services, which must provide special medication, only accessible at the hospital, to chronic patients living in remote rural areas. This means that patients must make long trips to the main hospital, generating significant costs and loss of time for them, and bottlenecks at the hospital. Additionally, the centralization of drug-dispensing in urban areas  exacerbates disparities in access to health care between urban and rural areas. Due to its flexibility, versatility and quick response time, drones can help to tackle this issue and enable the delivery of medical treatments to multiple locations.

OPTIVERY´s solution will efficiently meet the real-time needs of galician rural health centres, select the optimised route, and effectively transport the drugs, enhancing healthcare accessibility and reducing the burden on rural residents.