Patient–Centred Objectives as an Alternative to Maximum Utilisation: Comparing Surgical Case Solutions

Operating Room (OR) planning and scheduling is a research topic widely discussed in the literature, in which several performance criteria have been proposed to evaluate the OR planning decisions. Although the OR utilisation is the leading objective, from research experiences, long waiting lists lead to a satisfactory filling of ORs even fixing other objectives. In this paper we analyse the impact on OR utilisation of two patient–centred objectives: the waiting time minimisation and the workload balance. In the former the most commonly used patient–centred criterion is taken into account, while the latter leads to a smooth stay bed occupancies determining a smooth workload in the ward and, by consequence, an improved quality of care provided to patients. To the best of our knowledge, a comparison of the planning determined by these criteria is not yet available in literature.