Articles, Papers

Fire Service Research Paper:

Correlation and Regression: An Example with Population and EMS Calls for the City of Brampton

The fire service exists today in an environment constantly inundated with data, however, by itself data is of little use to anyone unless it is properly collected and analyzed.

Historically, the fire service has collected all sorts of data but failed to realize it's potential. The fire service of today is changing the way it conducts there business. It's not about just fighting fires as much as it is doing EMS, fire prevention, public education, inspections, investigations and other non-traditional but important tasks which are vital to the communities the fire service protects. Most fire departments in the Province of Ontario have to balance limited resources and justify daily operations and finances in the face of some tough economic times. I believe this is a scenario that every fire administrator can relate to. How well a fire department can do may depend on how well it uses it's information that it collects.

The research paper tilted "CORRELATION AND REGRESSION: AN EXAMPLE WITH POPULATION AND EMS CALLS FOR THE CITY OF BRAMPTON" (.pdf) was prepared in July 2004 as part of my undergraduate studies for the degree of Bachelor of Science in Fire Services Administration. The research paper estimated that the City of Brampton Fire & Emergency Services would respond to an estimated 6765 EMS calls based on an estimated population of 386,539. For the year 2004 the City of Brampton Fire & Emergency Services actually responded to 6532 EMS calls.

From a statistical perspective this represents a standard error of approximately 3.5% and is within 95% which is said to be within statistical theory. If my statistical assumptions were to be 100% correct for the amount of medical calls that we responded to (6532) the estimated population for 2004 would be approximately 375,000.

In summary, this statistical correlation should be considered to be a useful tool in estimating the amount of future projected EMS calls based on population as indicated on page 12 of the report.

Should you have any questions or would like to discuss this research paper please contact me at (416) 722-8164.

Len Papp,CET, CFEI, GIFireE
Fire Prevention Officer
Assistant to the Fire Marshal
Brampton Fire & Emergency Services
Phone (416) 806-4237