HSI_GenericNonEmergencyFirstAppt, running for the same person on the same date twice

[EvaJanouskova]

I noticed the generic non-emergency appointment HSI_GenericNonEmergencyFirstAppt running for the same person on the same date twice. Is that possible? Should that be possible?

I ran a simulation from 2010 to 2030 (incl.) with an initial population of 10K and printed what is happening for one person during all the events from the wasting module:
wasting_analysis__minimal_model.o368134.1.txt
-> see NON-EMERGENCY APPT on self.sim.date=Timestamp('2025-04-04 00:00:00')

I assume this should not be happening?

[marghe-molaro]

Hi @EvaJanouskova,

I guess a number of things could be happening:

• Different symptoms could lead to individuals seeking different generic non-emergency appt for different reasons, and it so happens that both are scheduled on the same day, or:
• The generic non-emergency appt schedules another non-emergency appt for the same day (this seems strange but may happen e.g. if further testing is needed at the triaging level to determine the referral path?);
• There's a bug somewhere.

You said that you "fixed this" for the wasting module, so what was it that was leading to this happening?

[tbhallett]

Yes, Margherita’s option 1 is what we expect to happen.

[EvaJanouskova]

@marghe-molaro, @tbhallett, Is each generic non-emergency appointment then scheduled for particular symptom? For example, once it would be scheduled due to aids_symptoms, and despite having other symptoms as well, it will schedule the generic non-emergency appointment for the sole symptom aids_symptoms. Then, because of another symptom being weight_loss, it will schedule the generic non-emergency appointment for the sole symptom weight_loss. Is that happening?

If so, I may just add: if 'weight_loss' in symptoms, do this; otherwise, don't.

[tbhallett]

Hi Eva, Please have a look at the SymptomManager module code and HealthSeekingBehaviour module code and the associated writeups. That should set out the logic that we’re trying to enforce here and is probably the safest way to learn about it, as there are some subtleties and edge cases.