2019-2020 MIAE Graduate Seminar Series

MIAE 2019-2020 Graduate Seminar Series

Optimizing the flow of radiotherapy patients

Prof. Nadia Lahrichi, École Polytechnique de Montréal

Abstract:

Efficient flow of radiotherapy patients in cancer treatment centers is tightly related to the availability of the physicians and the use of the linear accelerators. Variability is one of the most complicating factors to consider into the planning activities: patients arrival and priorities are not known in advance, and duration of treatments is rarely constant. In practice, centers use   

grids of constant length for patients’ appointments, and relatively intuitive strategies to choose the right slot for each patient. In this presentation, we discuss more sophisticated methods based on operations research for physician scheduling and patient appointment booking. Patient appointments are based on their priority, target wait times and duration of treatment. Before starting their treatment, patients first consult with the physician, then undergo a set of sets. First, we propose to base the physician schedule on patients activities. This ensures that physicians are never the bottleneck in patient flow. Second, we develop a hybrid method combining stochastic optimization and online optimization to schedule patients. We use information from future arrivals of patients to model as accurately as possible the expected use of resources. We also use predictive models to better assess the patient's treatment duration (preparation, entry into the room, treatment, etc.). We show that it is possible to create appointments schedules of different durations according to a set of criteria. This work is the result of a collaboration with the Center Intégré de Cancérologie de Laval.  

Biography of Prof. Nadia Lahrichi 

Nadia Lahrichi is an associate professor at the department of Mathematics and industrial engineering at Polytechnique Montreal. Her research is mainly focused towards applying modeling and operational research tools to improve patient flow in the healthcare system. She uses exact, metaheuristics and discrete event simulation approaches to tackle patient and resource scheduling problems. She has received the award for outstanding application of operational research (from the Canadian Operational research society) for solving the home health care routing and scheduling problem.  

Location & Time

EV12.163 Concordia University

Nov. 07th, 2019 11:00 AM – 12:00PM