A Novel Personnel Planning Method to Improve Operations Management: Transferring lessons learned from manufacturing to healthcare

Abstract

There is a solid body of knowledge on personnel planning in production and logistics, showcasing potential applications across various sectors, particularly in operations management in healthcare. This paper focuses on Medical Residency Scheduling Problems (RSP) in a cross-facility context, employing a real dataset from an Austrian hospital group to assess the applicability of production planning and control (PPC) optimization techniques. The study examines approximate, expert-driven, and exact mixed-integer programming methods, underscoring the approximate method's effectiveness and rapidity in optimizing schedules against four objectives within a constrained period. The successful application of this novel method not only marks a significant advancement in scheduling systems but also demonstrates the potential for these methods to address broader scheduling challenges, significantly improving operational efficiency and quality. This approach offers insights for time-sensitive personnel planning, suggesting a versatile applicability of production-derived methods in healthcare scheduling.