Applying Operations Research at AUBMC :two pilot studies on material management and family medicine patient flow -

Abstract

This thesis is on applying Operations Research (OR) techniques to managing the operations of the American University of Beirut Medical Center (AUBMC). It is divided to two parts, of applying OR to (i) material management, and (ii) family medicine clinics patient flow modeling and analysis. Such OR applications are now common practices in the US with notable success in performance improvement. We aim on replicating this success at AUBMC, taking into account the distinctive features of the healthcare environment in Lebanon and the region. We first provide an overview of the current status of material management and patient flow at the family medicine clinics at AUBMC. We then provide a literature review on OR applications in healthcare, in specific, inventory management and patient flow. We then describe our preliminary results of the first pilot study, which is on applying OR to material management, where we propose a new base-stock policy that takes into account demand variability and the extended lead times AUBMC is faced with in Lebanon. This base-stock policy is shown to outperform an existing policy based on time series forecasting of the mean demand, and setting the stock level accordingly. AUBMC management validated our findings and is in the process of instituting the new Base Stock policy. We then discuss the second pilot study, on modeling and analyzing the patient flow at the family medicine clinics with the objective of reducing patient delay, improving appointment scheduling, and increasing employee utilization using a combination of discrete-event computer simulation and queueing theory. After successfully validating the model, i.e. being able to replicate the real performance system, we propose several improvements and perform useful analysis. In particular, we investigate the effect of appointment scheduling on waiting time and clinic revenue.