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A Web Based System for the Discovery of Blood Banks and Donors in
Emergencies
Chapter · October 2020
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-49342-4_57
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A Web Based System for the Discovery of Blood Banks
and Donors in Emergencies
Babajide Ayeni1, Olaperi Yeside Sowunmi1 and Sanjay Misra1 Rytis Maskeliūnas2,
Robertas Damaševičius2, Ravin Ahuja3
1
Covenant University, Ota, Nigeria
Kaunas University of Technology, Kaunas, Lithuania
3
Shri Vishwakarma Skill University, Gurgaon, India
2
ayenibolt@gmail.com
{olaperi.sowunmi; sanjay.misra}@covenantuniversity.edu.ng
Abstract. The blood is a connective tissue in the body and one of the most critical elements of human life. The shortage of this life-saving fluid has become a
recurrent problem to deliver medical care in many countries, because in emergencies, relatives of patients run around to get specific blood type when unavailable at the medical institution, without adequate information on the closest
available source. While there are existing blood bank management systems that
help locate available blood bank centers with the needed blood type, they do not
provide information on the nearest center and donor. This research therefore
developed a web based system that provides information for the discovery of
the blood bank centers and human donors with the highest proximity during
emergencies. Web development technologies were used, and the Google Map
API was used to track, calculate and display the location of each blood bank
and donor. The system thus aid users in obtaining blood faster rather than going
from one hospital to another in search for a specific blood type to reduce the
number of deaths caused by lack of blood during emergencies.
Keywords: Blood Bank Management System, Web Based System, Google
Map API.
1
Introduction
The blood is a connective tissue that transports substances throughout the body and
helps maintain a stable internal environment [1]. It is one of the most important elements of human life and has been referred to as the river of life [2]. Blood is to the
body, as the CPU is to the PC, and with this it can be established that the blood is an
essential and vital constituent of the body.
As the day passes by, there is a prevalence of accidents, ranging from simple injuries to deaths. Quite many individuals require blood for survival during emergencies,
2
but are handicapped by its unavailability. Even in cases where it is available, there is
an issue of proximity and time to obtain the blood. The American Red Cross Association asserts, that just one car accident victim can need up to 100 pints of blood. Furthermore, the National Blood Transfusion Service (NBTS) postulates that, Lagos (a
state in Nigeria) is projected to need at least 185,000 units of blood annually, but regrettably has only 80,000 units, as a result, in 2012, 4,260 people lost their lives to
road accidents.
Nigeria as country encounters a major problem in blood donation and blood bank
services. In 2012, a bomb blast occurred in Abuja wrecking the United Nations (UN)
building, leaving 21 dead and 73 injured. A significant number of these deaths can be
traced to the unavailability of blood at the right time and place. Some of the injured,
lost their lives because they were unable to access blood due to shortages and accessibility issues. The United Nation’s Children Fund (UNICEF) accounts that 145 pregnant women die every day in Nigeria and statistics have shown that 20% of maternal
deaths occur as a result of the unavailability of blood [3].
Technology attempts to bridge this gap via information systems which are designed for collecting, organizing, storing and communicating information, making
them readily available at the nick of time[4][5]. A Blood Bank Management System
(BBMS) can therefore come in place to help tackle the problem of proximity by
providing real-time information of where blood can be obtained to reduce the death
cases. The remainder of this work reports the development of such a system, section 2
presents a critical review of the literature and existing systems. Sections 3 and 4 describe the design and implementation respectively, while section 5 concludes with
recommendation and future works.
2
Literature Review
A Location Based Service (LBS) is an information service, accessed through mobile
devices using the mobile network and employing the geolocation ability of the mobile
device. According to [6], they are services that integrate a mobile device’s location or
position with several other information so as to provide more information and meaningful value to a user. They locate a mobile user geographically and deliver services
required by the user based on his current location. They can be used in different settings, such as health, business and personal life. In a health-based system, it can be
used to identify the location of people or objects, or finding the closest hospital or
location of a business associate[7]. Different techniques and tools are used to achieve
this, one of such is the Google Maps which was used in this project.
Google Maps are mapping services developed by Google. It gives a clear view of
satellite imagery, street maps, real-time traffic conditions (Google Traffic), enabling
one to plan route for traveling by any means of transportation. The service's front end
utilizes JavaScript, XML, and Ajax. It offers an Application Programming Interface
(API) that allows maps to be integrated on third-party websites. It also makes it possi-
3
ble to embed a locator to be used by businesses and other organizations in different
countries across the globe [8][9].
Mobile Geographic Information Systems (GIS) implement the GIS into a mobile
phone allowing it to capture, store, update, manipulate, analyze, and display geospatial data and information [10].
A sample mobile GIS was implemented in [10] by using Open Source technologies. A client-server solution was provided by using a Java servlet inside the Apache
Tomcat server. Java Mapscript, mapserver and some other classes are used to provide
the GIS functionalities. The authors also discussed technological aspects of Mobile
GIS along with some applications. Other issues like making mobile GIS context
aware, integration of the application with the position of user, finding solution to
problem of slow speed and connection cost were also addressed [10].
2.1
Related Works
Several similar applications developed specifically to address the issue of locating
available blood banks and donors readily in an emergency exist and they are discussed in this section.
The LifeBank App is an instinctive blood donor database that moves committed
Africans to give blood and save lives in their group [11]. It is a venture commercial
center for blood donation. The application searches for the available blood and blood
items that patients require in its database. With an agile coordination framework set
up, items are delivered to patients on time. An extension of this application, the LifeBankPlus is a smart blood system that connects hospitals and blood banks and helps
individuals, find blood needed faster, safer, and cheaper. However, when a user orders
for blood the system does not provide the nearest center to where the particular blood
type can be obtained, it only provides several locations without sorting them on the
basis of proximity.
The Location Based Online Blood Bank System (LOBB) uses a Global Positioning
System and nearest neighbor algorithm for primary blood transfusion services [12].
The main aim is to provide a fast and efficient way to gain attention of potential donors in the need of hour. It includes the use of SMS and Email services such that the
donors can locate the patient when the request for blood is generated. The system
helps in the process of blood donation. It consists of a web application which acts as
an interface for the clients of the of the system and a database for storing the donor’s
data, blood bank details and hospital details. The system was built to locate only donors, and not blood bank centers
The central blood bank database with anti GPS mobile system was primarily designed to have a focal database of blood donors and make a hospital administration to
locate the present area of a donor in the event of crises or emergencies. It utilizes GPS
with incredible exactness to discover the position of any of the nearest donors through
a web gateway [13]. The users of the systems are administrators (this could be a general body from the central blood bank agency) blood banks, hospitals and clinics. Lay
individuals do not have access to the system.
4
The Optimal facility for tracking the location of blood bank and donor is a proposed system which is aimed at solving existing problems with other system using
Global Positioning System (GPS) for tracking of nearest blood banks and donors. It
requires an android device that supports a GPS. The application then has to be installed on the device. During the urgent need of blood, a user can instantly access
people with a particular, or related blood group and contact them through phone calls
or text messages through the application [14]. The Android blood donor lifesaving
application on the other hand is a web application that interfaces all donors and patients. The system allows individuals to enlist as donors, and they can get an SMS
from neighbourhood customers who need blood to give in instances of need [15]. The
system however, does not supply the real time location of the donor, as his registered
address might differ from his current location.
The review shows some existing blood bank management system implemented but
a certain number of them are not present within the geographical location of Nigeria.
The only present one is the LifeBank app which only offers location on where blood
can be obtained, however, this system aims to provide a user with the nearest location
of a blood bank or donor in cases of emergency.
3
System Design
In developing the system, the requirements were gathered using requirements engineering techniques which were then modelled using the Unified Modelling Language
(UML). the database was also designed, properly normalized and validated using the
entity relationship diagram.
3.1
System Requirements
The requirement analysis phase identified the functional requirements and nonfunctional requirements for this project. The functional requirements include:
1. The system should give users access to login and register
2. The system should obtain users IP address to get the users location
3. The system should provide users with locations of the nearest blood banks and donors that have the required blood type with the aid of a map and distance/time representations.
The non-functional requirements for the system include:
1. Speed: The system should be able to provide quick results for the users based on
the options selected.
2. Size: The system should not take up a lot of the user’s systems’ memory.
3. Ease of use: The system should be easy to use with a clean user interface.
4. Reliability: The system should have very little down time and produce a small percentage of errors.
5
5. Robustness: The system should be able to recover quickly and efficiently from
failures if any.
6. Portability: The system must be able to function properly on a wide range of devices.
7. Scalability: The system must perform efficiently even as it grows.
3.2
System Architecture
The system implements a three-tier architecture. As the name connotes, the architecture is made of 3 tiers namely; Client tier (First Level), Logic tier (Middle Level) and
the Data tier (Final Level). All three tiers work together to create a balanced system as
shown Fig.1.
Client Tier
This tier is the basis for the Graphical User Interface (GUI), it is medium of interaction between the user and the system. This first tier is accessed via a web browser.
The web browser then communicates with web servers using standardized protocols.
This tier was developed using HTML and CSS 3 for enhanced portability across several platforms.
Fig. 1. The 3-tier System Architecture
Logic Tier
The second or middle tier performs the function of bringing the client tier (first tier) and data tier (last tier) together. It receives data/information from the user through
the client tier and it interacts with the database in the data tier based on the input/data
6
it received. This tier is the core of the system and it was developed using PHP, and
hosted on the Apache web server.
Data Tier
The third tier of the 3-tier system architecture is made up of the database and the
database management system (DBMS). The primary use of this tier is for storing,
accessing, retrieving, and modifying data based on the inputs gotten from the client
and logic tier respectively. MySQL was used for this tier.
3.3
Logical Design
The Use Case diagram is a graphical representation of the interactions that occur between the various components of an application system. Use case diagrams were used
to identify and organize the system requirements [16]. Fig. 2 which is the use case
diagram for the system shows extensively the various inclusions of functionality between the users and the operations they can carry out on the system. The two categories of actors for the system are the users which can be patients, hospital or blood
bank representatives and the administrator at the back end.
Fig. 2. Use case diagram for the system
The user can register, and login subsequently. The user can also search for a blood
bank or donor and view the resulting map showing the locations of the required blood
type. The administrator can upload or approve blood bank centers or donors and know
their status per time. Fig. 3 shows the sequence of operations in the system. Once the
user interacts with the system, specifying the required blood type and location, the
database is searched, and if the required blood type or component is available, the
location of the donor or bank is plotted on the map, and the distance and expected
time difference between the two parties is specified.
7
User
Google
Map
System
Database
SearchQuery()
Load nearest Locations
Calculate Distance and Perform Analysis
Display Result in Map
Fig. 3. Sequence diagram
4
Implementation
The user interface was developed using Hyper-Text Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and JavaScript. They were used for designing and implementing some functionalities in web application. PHP, an HTML-embedded scripting
language was used to design the backend of the system while jQuery, a cross-platform
JavaScript library simplified the client-side scripting. They were used because they
are free and open-source [17]. The MySQL relational database management system
(RDBMS), was used to implement the database for storing required information. In
addition, the Google Map API (Application Programming Interface) [18] was used to
implement the location tracking and map generation functionality. In all, the Model–
View–Controller (MVC) software architectural pattern was used in order to separate
internal representations of information from the ways it is presented to and captured
from the user [19].
Fig. 4. The Login Page of the Blood Discovery system
8
The screen shots for the developed system are presented in Fig. 4, Fig. 5 and Fig.6.
Fig. 4 shows the login page for a registered user while Fig.5 shows what the search
interface looks like. Fig. 6, shows the output screen displaying the map and the distance of the user to locations with the required blood type.
Fig. 5. Interface to search for Blood Type
Fig. 6. The Result Page
9
5
Conclusion
This project addressed the challenge of finding blood during emergencies by creating
a system that helps users find the nearest blood banks and donors which is a very
important aspect of life. Undoubtedly, this approach is faster than utilizing the manual
method of going from one hospital to another in search for a particular blood type,
thereby reducing the number of deaths caused by lack of blood during emergencies.
The field of blood discovery still has a lot of issues that are not completely resolved. Although, this topic seeks to address issues with blood bank access, it is not
designed to deliver the blood to the user.
Acknowledgement
The authors acknowledge the support and sponsorship provided by Covenant University through the Centre for Research, Innovation and Discovery (CUCRID).
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