A FLEXIBLE NURSE SCHEDULING SUPPORT SYSTEM.
Contributors: Arizona State University.
Published: 1987
Number of pages: 344
Subjects: Engineering, Industrial.; Health Sciences, Health Care Management.
Description: Scheduling nursing personnel in hospitals is very complex due to the variety of conflicting interests or objectives between hospitals and nurses. Also, demand, which varies widely over 24-hour a day 7-day a week, is skill specific and hard to forecast. In the face of this complexity, the present nurse scheduling models have met with little success. In this research, a more flexible decision support system that will satisfy the interests of both hospitals and nurses through the formulated and tested alternative optimization models which accommodate flexible work patterns and integrate the time of day and day of week problems, is conceptualized.

The following models were formulated as alternative models of the decision support system needed for nurse scheduling support: (1) The integrated personnel scheduling models which are based on the traditional robust set covering model were adopted for the complicated nurse scheduling environment (Model 1) by extending the model to include 24-hour day and other shifts combination. (2) Two alternative flexible goal programming models were developed (Models 2 and 3). Model 2 is a goal programming version of Model 1 which uses integer goal programming solution algorithm. In order to develop Model 2 first, the goal programming version of the integrated personnel scheduling model was formulated. Then it was adopted to the nurse scheduling environment. Model 3 integrates the time of day problem with zero-one goal programming solution algorithm and allows nurses to input in the scheduling decision by accommodating nurses' preferences. (3) An assignment model which uses zero-one linear programming algorithm was developed to assign work patterns to individual nurses based on the nurses' preference score. By allowing nurses to pick the schedule that fits their lives and/or using this assignment model, schedules were disaggregated. The extension of the Assignment Model was also formulated. (4) The extensions of Model 1 were formulated to allow: (a) the solution of all skill types simultaneously; and (b) downward (vertical) substitution.

Models' schedules were proved to be better than the schedules of the St. Luke's Medical Center in Phoenix, Arizona, since they satisfied both hospitals' and nurses' objectives in scheduling and eliminated the patterns that nurses do not like in scheduling.

The application scenario and architecture of the nurse scheduling support system were explored.
Notes: Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 48-02, Section: B, page: 0533.

Thesis (PH.D.)--ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY, 1987.

School code: 0010.