A reference point method to triple-objective assignment of supporting services in a healthcare institution

Abstract

This paper presents an application of mixed integer programming model for optimal allocation of workers among supporting services in a hospital. The services include logistics, inventory management, financial management, operations management, medical analysis, etc. The optimality criterion of the problem is to minimize operational costs of supporting services subject to some specific constraints. The constraints represent specific conditions for resource allocation in a hospital. The overall problem is formulated as a triple-objective assignment model, where the decision variables represent the assignment of people to various jobs. A reference point approach with the Chebyshev metric is applied for the problem solution. The results of computational experiments modeled on a real data from a hospital in Lesser Poland are reported.