Operations research applications in hospital operations: Part II

ABSTRACT

Hospital managers are tasked with developing innovative strategies to provide patients with quality healthcare in an effective and efficient manner. Operations research (OR) methods have been applied to hospital operations to improve effectiveness and efficiency.

In this three-part article, we review OR applications in hospital environments. In particular, we develop a timeline of events in US healthcare from the late 1940s to 2015 and separate the timeline into four eras: Expansion, Cost Control, Reform, and Accountability. Part I of the article describes the Eras of Expansion and Cost Control, Part II describes the Era of Reform, and Part III describes the Era of Accountability. Research performed during each era is contextualized and stratified by OR method and hospital operations application area.

The following article is Part II of the three-part article, which details the OR applications in hospital operation area publications from 1990 to 2009. During the Era of Reform, the most commonly used OR methods were discrete event simulation and deterministic modeling (optimization), while the hospital operations areas where OR methods were applied were staff, room, and patient scheduling, as well as general patient flow assessment.

KEYWORDS:

• discrete event simulation
• optimization
• stochastic processes
• scheduling
• patient flow