A stochastic programming approach to surgery scheduling under parallel processing principle

Batuhan Çelik, Serhat Gul and Melih Çelik

Omega, 2023, vol. 115, issue C

Abstract: Parallel processing is a principle which enables simultaneous implementation of anesthesia induction and operating room (OR) turnover with the aim of improving OR utilization. In this article, we study the problem of scheduling surgeries for multiple ORs and induction rooms (IR) that function based on the parallel processing principle under uncertainty. We propose a two-stage stochastic mixed-integer programming model considering the uncertainty in induction, surgery and turnover durations. We sequence patients and set appointment times for surgeries in the first stage and assign patients to IRs at the second stage of the model. We show that an optimal myopic policy can be used for IR assignment decisions due to the special structure of the model. We minimize the expected total cost of patient waiting time, OR idle time and IR idle time in the objective function. We enhance the model formulation using bounds on variables and symmetry-breaking constraints. We implement a novel progressive hedging algorithm by proposing a penalty update method and a variable fixing mechanism. Based on real data of a large academic hospital, we compare our solution approach with several scheduling heuristics from the literature. We assess the additional benefits and costs associated with the implementation of parallel processing using near-optimal schedules. We examine how the benefits are inflated by increasing the number of IRs. Finally, we estimate the value of stochastic solution to underline the importance of considering uncertainty in durations.

Keywords: Surgery scheduling; Stochastic programming; Parallel processing; Progressive hedging (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0305048322002055
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jomega:v:115:y:2023:i:c:s0305048322002055

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/supportfaq.cws_home/regional
https://shop.elsevie ... _01_ooc_1&version=01

DOI: 10.1016/j.omega.2022.102799

Access Statistics for this article

Omega is currently edited by B. Lev

More articles in Omega from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().