Scheduling

This is one of the most important functions for the healthcare

sector. It includes optimal utilization of resources to reduce waiting time and
wastage of resources. Analytics, along with the in-place systems, help formulate a
schedule to be optimized for defined objectives associated with the value of
offering service, the standard of the service provided, and health outcomes while
also meeting defined constraints. Block scheduling is used in the case of surgeries
for scheduling, in which time slots and particular operating rooms are reserved for
specific doctors or specialties. Patients may then be assigned to dates supported
by the standards defined by each surgeon. Computer algorithms are used to assign
the slots based on optimality to allocate resources and surgeons to specific
blocks.

Nurse and doctor scheduling- Doctor timings are scheduled in a way that a doctor of
a respective specialty is available at any given time and doctors of same specialty
do not have timing clash to avoid wastage of service time of doctors. Also, nurses
are managed department wise were the no. Of nurses are variable at ny given time in
any given department.

Ambulance service scheduling- ambulances are allocated to different areas and the
dense areas are identified for which ambulances are reserved specially. This
allocation is variable depending upon the requirements on a particular day. Optimal
no. of ambulances is calculated and maintained respectively based on the time lapse
of an ambulance between a call and for the ambulance to bring in the patient to the
hospital and become ready for another.

OT planning and scheduling- this is the most sensitive part of scheduling as delay
of even a minute is not desirable. OT is kept closed if it is treatable without it
and is reserved for serious patients. Along with OT the doctors and nurse
specialized for it are also scheduled such that there is always atleast a team
present for every OT. The resources required for the OT are stocked well in advance
and in the upper limit as the patient cannot wait here for restocking.

Beds management- Inpatients are managed here based on the bed-days. The hospital
tries to reduce the bed-days in case of rising demand for beds while no hurry in
case there are ample beds. Beds are classified into basic, moderate, and premium.
This classification is based on services provided with extra resources and hence
the fees charged differ with premium being the highest and basic the lowest.

Medical supply management- Medical supply is managed based on data analytics of the
historic records of the hospital to identify the cycle of medicines. This includes
the shelf time of medicine and their demand which may also vary seasonally. The
medicines are shortlisted based on demand and the in-house doctors’
recommendations.

Appointment scheduling- To maintain the footsteps of a healthy environment in a

hospital, appointments are scheduled for patients with doctors with the help of the
ERP systems.

Machinery equipment scheduling- Equipements are allocate to specific rooms of

treatment based on the functionality. Critical equipment is stocked extra even on
no availability of room to cater to the failure of systems. While smaller and non-
critical equipment such as an oximeter is not stored based on rooms as they can be
used anywhere, and a room cannot be wasted for it but also the minimum level is
maintained based on the no. Of beds.