Abstract
In this paper, novel integer programming formulations are developed for solving the optimal scheduling of patients waiting for radiotherapy treatment. In this specific clinical domain, the suitable management and control of a patients’ waiting list strongly affect both the quality of the therapeutical outcome, in terms of effectiveness, and the cost-saving use of the overall therapeutical resources, in terms of efficiency. The proposed models allow the best scheduling strategy to be devised by taking into account the quality of the health care service offered to the patient as well as the status and the preferences of the patient. The computational experiments, carried out on realistic scenarios and considering real data, are very promising and show the efficiency and robustness of the proposed models to address the problem under consideration.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bailey NTJ, Welch JD (1952) Appointment systems in hospital outpatient departments. Lancet 259
Barendsen GW (1982) Dose fractionation, dose rate and isoeffect relationships for normal tissue responses. Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys 11: 1981–1997
Burke E, De Causmaecker P, Vanden BG (1998) A hybrid tabu search algorithm for the nurse rostering problem. Lect Notes Artif Intell 1585: 187–194
Burke EK, De Causmaecker P, Vanden BG, Van Landeghem H (2004a) The state of the art of nurse rostering. J Sched 7: 441–499
Burke E, De Causmaecker P, Vanden BG (2004b) Novel metaheuristic approaches to Nurse rostering problems in Belgian hospitals, In: Leung J (ed) Handbook of scheduling: algorithms, models and performance analysis, Chap 44, CRC Press, Boca Raton, pp 44.1–44.18
Burnet NG, Routsis DS, Murrell P, Burton KE, Taylor PJ, Thomas SJ, Williams MV, Prevost AT (2001) A tool to measure radiotherapy complexity and workload: derivation from the basic treatment equivalent (BTE) concept. Clin Oncol 13: 14–23
Bellanti F, Carello G, Della Croce F, Tadei R (2004) A greedy-based neighborhood search approach to a nurse rostering problem. Eur J Oper Res 153: 28–40
Cayirli T, Veral E (2003) Outpatient scheduling in health care: a review of literature. Prod Oper Manag 12: 519–549
Cayirli T, Veral E, Rosen H (2006) Designing appointment scheduling systems for ambulatory care services. Health Care Manag Sci 9(1): 47–58
Cheang B, Lib H, Lim A, Rodrigues B (2003) Nurse rostering problems-a bibliographic survey. Eur J Oper Res 151(3): 447–460
Chen JG, Yeung T (1993) Hybrid expert system approach to Nurse scheduling. Comput Nurs 11(4): 183–190
Conforti D, Guerriero F, Guido R (2008) Optimization models for radiotherapy patients scheduling. 4OR 6(3):263–278
DeVita VT, Hellman S, Rosenberg SA (2007) Cancer: principles and practice of oncology, 7th edn. Lippincott, Philadelphia
Dowsland KA (1998) Nurse scheduling with tabu search and strategic oscillation. Eur J Oper Res 106: 393–407
Dowsland KA, Thompson J (2000) Solving a nurse scheduling problem with knapsacks, networks and tabu search. J Oper Res Soc 51: 825–833
Ernst AT, Jiang H, Krishnamoorthy M, Sier D (2004a) Staff scheduling and rostering: a review of applications, methods and models. Eur J Oper Res 153(1): 3–27
Ernst AT, Jiang H, Krishnamoorthy M, Owens B, Sier D (2004b) An annotated bibliography of personnel scheduling and rostering. Ann Oper Res 127: 21–144
Han Y, Huh SJ, Ju SG, Ahn YC, Lim DH, Lee JE, Park W (2005) Impact of an electronic chart on the staff workload in a radiation oncology department. Jpn J Clin Oncol 35(8): 470–474
Harper PR, Gamlin H (2003) Reduced outpatient waiting times with improved appointment scheduling: a simulation modelling approach. OR Spectr 25: 207–222
Jaumard B, Semet F, Vovor T (1998) A generalized linear programming model for nurse scheduling. Eur J Oper Res 107: 11–18
Kapamara T, Sheibani K, Haas OCL, Reeves CR, Petrovic D (2006) A review of scheduling problems in radiotherapy. In: Proceedings of the eighteenth international conference on systems engineering (ICSE2006), Burnham KJ, Haas OCL, Coventry University, UK, pp 201–207
Lim KSH, Vinoid SK, Bull C, Brien PO, Kenny L (2005) Prioritization of radiotherapy in Australia and New Zealand. Australas Radiol 49: 485–488
Millar H, Kiragu M (1998) Cyclic and non-cyclic scheduling of 12 h shift nurses by network programming. Eur J Oper Res 104: 3582–3592
Miller HE, William P, Gustave JR (1976) Nurse scheduling using mathematical programming. Oper Res 24(5): 857–870
Perez C, Brady L, Halperin E, Schmidt-Ullrich R (2004) Principles and practice of radiation oncology, 4th edn. Lippincott, Philadelphia
Petrovic S, Beddoe G, Vanden BG (2003) Storing and adapting repair experiences in personnel rostering, In: Burke EK, De Causmaecker P (eds) Practice and theory of automated timetabling, fourth international conference, Gent, Springer, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 2740:185–186
Petrovic S, Leung W, Song X, Sundar S (2006) Algorithms for radiotherapy treatment booking. In: Proceedings of the 25th workshop of the UK Planning and Scheduling Special Interest Group (PlanSIG’2006), Nottingham, UK
Preater J (2001) A bibliography of queues in health and medicine. Keele Mathematics Research Report, Issue 01-1:1-11
Ragaz J, Olivotto IA, Spinelli JJ, Phillips N, Jackson SM, Wilson KS (2004) Locoregional radiation therapy in patients with high-risk breast cancer receiving adjuvant chemotherapy: 20-year results of the British Columbia randomized trial. J Natl Cancer Inst 97: 116–126
Turner KJ, Qian B (2002) Protocol techniques for testing radiotherapy accelerators. In: Vardi M, Peled D (eds) Proceedings of formal techniques for networked and distributed systems (FORTE XV). Springer, Berlin
Valouxis C, Housos E (2000) Hybrid optimization techniques for the workshift and rest assignment of nursing personnel. Artif Intell Med 20: 155–175
Washington CM, Leaver D (2003) Principles and practice of radiation therapy. C.V. Mosby. Elsevier, St. Louis, Amsterdam
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Conforti, D., Guerriero, F., Guido, R. et al. An optimal decision-making approach for the management of radiotherapy patients. OR Spectrum 33, 123–148 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00291-009-0170-y
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00291-009-0170-y