(1) The document summarizes a research seminar about increasing efficiency in delivering patient care using simulation and modeling. (2) It discusses using data from various sources like patient records and surveys to develop tools to monitor hospital department performance and critical healthcare system factors. (3) Accurate process models are used to understand healthcare delivery, identify issues like bottlenecks, and analyze potential improvements through simulation of "what if" scenarios.

1. ICCC Research Seminar
Tuesday, 16 October 2012
4.00-5.00 pm
L3 Conference Room, Illawarra Cancer Care Centre
Increasing the Efficiency in Delivering Patient-care
Using Simulation & Modeling
SMART Infrastructure Facility, University of Wollongong
Process improvement studies integrated cancer care pathways are increasingly seen as the key to streamlining
patient care services; however, to date, such studies have been few and far between [1-3]. One of the key issues
associated with these improvement studies is the lack of approaches to use large amounts of heterogeneous service
related data generated in hospitals (we use the term ‘heterogeneous’ to represent complementary types of data
acquired through multiple sources). Furthermore, conflicting information and missing or unclear data adds to the
difficulty in process improvement efforts. While information gathered from various sources along the cancer care
pathways can be useful, currently, there is a lack of systematic knowledge acquisition and modelling, as well as
performing meaningful analysis for service improvements. As a result, information available through various
sources is not effectively used to enhance the understanding of the complex and dynamic service delivery
processes. Developing and implementing productivity tools without a thorough understanding of care pathways can
be incomplete and ineffective. To deal with these challenges, increasingly, importance is being placed on
developing systems approaches based on knowledge acquisition, process modelling and simulations.
(i) Knowledge acquisition based on various data sources such as survey data, electronic patient records,
electronic tracking information, and other IT systems data, helps to develop tools and techniques to (a)
monitor the performances of various service delivery departments in hospital; and; (b) critical factors
affecting the healthcare system;
(ii) Accurate and scalable process models help to understand healthcare service delivery processes, which are
further used for (a) process visualisation and communication; (b) process re-design; and, (c) simulation and
analysis; and,
(iii) Models helps in identifying process issues such as bottlenecks, low patient throughput, large patient wait
times, and low resource utilisations by analysing/estimating the system performances against various
“what-if or improvement” scenarios
The main goal of this research is to improve different aspects of the management in health care systems. This
research will investigate and develop simulation models representing healthcare services with the goal of assisting
in the development of efficiency improvements in major hospitals.
REFERENCES
[1] NAE/IOM, Building a Better Delivery System: A New Engineering/Health Care Partnership, Technical report, National
Academy Engineering and Institute of Medicine, 2005.
[2] National Research Council, Computational Technology for Effective Health Care: Immediate Steps and Strategic
Directions, Editors: Willam W. Stead and Herbert S. Lin; Committee on Engaging the Computer Science Research Community
in Health Care Informatics, 2009, 1-120.
[3] Yates, Patsy (2004) Cancer Care Coordinators: Realising the Potential for Improving the Patient Journey. Cancer Forum
28(3):128-132.
For more details or if you would like to present please contact Martin Carolan.
(martin.carolan@sesiahs.health.nsw.gov.au)