Boston Medical Center: implementing system changes to patient flow logistics

The case discusses the application of operations management techniques to healthcare services, with a particular focus on patient flow logistics. In 2003, Boston Medical Center was facing different operational problems, such as Emergency Department overcrowding and diversions, elective surgical cases cancelled or postponed, patient treated in inappropriate hospital settings, stressful working conditions especially for nurses (many hours of over-time, over work, high unpredictability and variability, long shifts). In order to solve these problems, the Chief Medical Officer, defined three different possible areas for intervention: optimize the management of urgent/emergency cases, re-organize the entire OR scheduling process, and improve the patient flow within the hospital. Students are asked to evaluate these operational strategies using some fundamental operations management tools and frameworks such as: (i) process analysis; (ii) variability methodology; (iii) logistics; (iv) patient flows; (v) capacity analysis and planning and (vi) queuing theory.