Title: A tabu search heuristic approach for allocating operating room capacity

Authors: Majid M. Aldaihani

Addresses: Department of Industrial and Management Systems Engineering, College of Engineering and Petroleum, Kuwait University, P.O. Box 5969, 13060 Safat, Kuwait

Abstract: In this paper, two methodologies for allocating hospital operating room (OR) capacity to medical specialties were developed. The first methodology integrates a linear programming (LP) model with a tabu search (TS) heuristic algorithm and the second methodology integrates a greedy search algorithm (GA) with a TS heuristic algorithm. The models determine a monthly operating room allocating template that minimises inpatients' length of stay. A number of patient type priorities (e.g., emergency over inpatient) and clinical constraints (e.g., maximum number of hours allocated to each specialty) are included in the models. The proposed methodologies are tested using real data, analysed using various scenarios and compared in terms of solution quality and computational time.

Keywords: linear programming; tabu search; surgery; operating room capacity; block time scheduling; operating theatres; healthcare management; hospitals; greedy search; resource allocation.

DOI: 10.1504/IJOR.2014.065409

International Journal of Operational Research, 2014 Vol.21 No.3, pp.279 - 292

Received: 12 Oct 2012
Accepted: 18 Feb 2013
Published online: 31 Oct 2014 *

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