An integrated simulation-DEA approach to improve quality care of medical centres

Ali Azadeh, Masoome Sepahi and Sara Motevali Haghighi

International Journal of Process Management and Benchmarking, 2013, vol. 3, issue 3, 352-370

Abstract: Overcrowding is common problem for emergency departments (ED) and related decision making process. This is due to low staff availability, limited budget, high costs and high patient volume. The stated issues decrease the quality care of medical centres and EDs. Therefore, EDs and medical centre must implement highly efficient systems that maximise the utilisation of their available resources to minimise the cost and minimise time in system to maximise patient satisfaction. In this paper, computer simulation and CCR output-oriented data envelopment analysis (DEA) model are used to evaluate the efficiency of various alternatives to improve and optimise the quality care of EDs. Moreover, computer simulation is used to generate the related outputs for DEA model. DEA model is then executed with proper inputs and outputs to provide optimisation model from a list of potential alternatives. This is the first study that introduces an integrated simulation-DEA as an optimisation approach for handling patient satisfaction in the EDs.

Keywords: quality care; patient satisfaction; computer simulation; data envelopment analysis; DEA; process management; benchmarking management; medical centres; overcrowding; emergency departments; optimisation modelling; resource management. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
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