Title: Effects of duration of visits on COVID-19 infection using a multi-agent simulation and lean concept

Authors: Woramol C. Watanabe; Patchanee Patitad

Addresses: Faculty of of Logistics and Digital Supply Chain, Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, Thailand ' Faculty of of Logistics and Digital Supply Chain, Naresuan University, Phitsanulok, Thailand

Abstract: In the COVID-19 pandemic, social distancing become a critical issue. People need to avoid spending time in crowded places. However, some activities cannot be postponed such as an appointment in a hospital. For geriatric care, there are many processes that mean elderly patients need to spend a long time. While they also have a higher risk of serious illness from COVID-19 in a limited space. To decrease time spent, this research aims to improve the case study in Thailand by using value-added analysis and the lean concept with the ECSR technique. Besides, an analysis of the effects of the duration of patient visits on the infection is presented by using a multi-agent simulation. The result presents that the duration of patient visits is decreased by 12.82% from the current operation. The simulation also declares that if the duration is decreased, the number of COVID-19-infected patients is significantly decreased.

Keywords: lean healthcare; value-added analysis; COVID-19; multi-agent simulation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJLSM.2025.145687

International Journal of Logistics Systems and Management, 2025 Vol.50 No.4, pp.498 - 509

Received: 27 Aug 2022
Accepted: 02 Sep 2022
Published online: 15 Apr 2025 *

Full-text access for editors Full-text access for subscribers Purchase this article Comment on this article