Appointment Scheduling Problem in Complexity Systems of the Healthcare Services: A Comprehensive Review

Ala, Ali; Chen, Feng

doi:10.1155/2022/5819813

Cited by 30 publications

(18 citation statements)

References 151 publications

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“…To alleviate this issue, health care facilities should be proactive and create an improvement committee that is responsible for implementing changes that will help face the growing volumes of patient care including hiring more full-time staff and establishing proper workflows [47] , [49] , [50] . Therefore, future studies should further analyze outpatient clinic operations and address ways potential challenges associated with clinical burnout can be avoided.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A comparative analysis of outpatient nutrition clinic scheduling outcomes based on in-person and telehealth patient care delivery modalities

Humbert¹,

Mauldin²,

Saarony³

2023

Healthcare Analytics

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

A comparative analysis of outpatient nutrition clinic scheduling outcomes based on in-person and telehealth patient care delivery modalities

Humbert¹,

Mauldin²,

Saarony³

2023

Healthcare Analytics

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“…Other scholars explored shortening the patient waiting time to improve their satisfaction in relation to different aspects. Ala et al [22] accomplished a comprehensive review of appointment scheduling and proposed several methods to shorten the patients' waiting time in health care centers. Information technology has been used to optimize the identification process for outpatients having blood drawn and improve patients' satisfaction [23].…”

Section: Principal Findingsmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Effect of Mobile Payment on Payment Waiting Time for Outpatients With Medical Insurance: Historically Controlled Study

Xie¹,

Cao²

2023

JMIR Form Res

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Background Waiting for a long time to make payments in outpatient wards and long queues of insured patients at the checkout window are common in many hospitals across China. To alleviate the problem of long queues for payment, many hospitals in China have established various mobile apps that those without health insurance can use. However, medically insured outpatients are still required to pay manually at the checkout window. Therefore, it is urgent to use information technology to innovate and optimize the outpatient service process, implement mobile payment for medically insured outpatients, and shorten the waiting time for outpatients, especially in the context of the COVID-19 epidemic. Furthermore, smartphone-based mobile payment for outpatients with health insurance could be superior to on-site cashier billing. Objective This study aimed to investigate the impact of smartphone-based mobile payment in relation to different aspects, such as waiting time, satisfaction with patients’ waiting time, payment experience, the proportion of those dissatisfied with payment, total outpatient satisfaction, and outpatient volume, and compare mobile payment with on-site payment. Methods This was a historically controlled study. This study analyzed the outpatients’ waiting time to make a medical insurance payment, their satisfaction with the waiting time and payment experience, the proportion of those dissatisfied with payment, and the outpatient volume of patients at Guangzhou Women and Children’s Medical Center 1 year before and after the implementation of mobile payment for medical insurance in January 2021. An independent sample 2-tailed t test was used to compare waiting time, satisfaction with waiting time, and overall satisfaction. Paired sample 2-tailed t test was used to compare monthly outpatient visits. The chi-square test was used to compare the percentages of patients dissatisfied with payment. Results After the implementation of mobile payment for medical insurance outpatients, the patients’ payment waiting time was significantly shortened (mean 45.28, SD 10.35 min vs mean 1.02, SD 0.25 min; t9014=53.396; P<.001), and satisfaction with waiting time and payment experience were significantly improved (mean 82.08, SD 3.17 vs mean 90.36, SD 3.45; t9014=–118.65; P<.001). Dissatisfaction with payment significantly decreased (10.27%, SD 2.18% vs 1.19% vs SD 0.30%; P<.001). The total satisfaction of outpatients significantly improved (mean 86.91, SD 3.23 vs mean 89.98, SD 3.31; t9014=–44.57; P<.001), and the outpatient volume increased (248,105.58, SD 89,280.76 vs 303,194.75, SD 53,773.12; t11=2.414; P=.03). Furthermore, payment efficiency improved, and the number of the on-site cashiers substantially decreased. Conclusions Mobile payment for health insurance significantly shortened patients’ payment waiting time; improved patient satisfaction on waiting time and payment experience and overall satisfaction; reduced the proportion of patients who were dissatisfied with payment and the cashier at the hospital; and increased monthly outpatient volume. This approach was effective and thus worthy of promoting.

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“…15 It shows that most of the literature only focuses on improving performance, such as length of stay in the emergency department 26,[38][39][40] or outpatient appointment scheduling and resource allocation. [41][42][43][44][45][46] However, the importance of effective blood counter settings for better patient flows is not discussed. Furthermore, how different blood counter settings affect patient waiting time in the outpatient units of both metabolism and nephrology divisions is missing in the literature.…”

Section: How Does Your Research Contribute To the Field?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Evaluating Different Strategies on the Blood Collection Counter Settings to Improve Patient Waiting Time in Outpatient Units

Chen

Tsai

Chou

et al. 2022

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Long patient waiting time is one of the major problems in the healthcare system and it would decrease patient satisfaction. Previous studies usually investigated how to improve the treatment flow in order to reduce patient waiting time or length of stay. The studies on blood collection counters have received less attention. Therefore, the objective of this study is to reduce the patient waiting time at outpatient clinics for metabolism and nephrology outpatients. A discrete-event simulation is used to analyze the four different strategies for blood collection counter resource allocation. Through analyzing four different strategic settings, the experimental results revealed that the maximum number of patients waiting before the outpatient clinics was reduced from 41 to 33 (20%); the maximum patient waiti-ng time at the outpatient clinics was decreased from 201.6 minutes to 83 minutes (59%). In this study, we found that adjusting the settings of blood collection counters would be beneficial. Assigning one exclusive blood collection counter from 8 to 10 am is the most suitable option with the least impact on the operational process for hospital staff. The results provide managerial insight regarding the cost-effective strategy selection for the hospital operational strategy.

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Appointment Scheduling Problem in Complexity Systems of the Healthcare Services: A Comprehensive Review

Cited by 30 publications

References 151 publications

A comparative analysis of outpatient nutrition clinic scheduling outcomes based on in-person and telehealth patient care delivery modalities

A comparative analysis of outpatient nutrition clinic scheduling outcomes based on in-person and telehealth patient care delivery modalities

The Effect of Mobile Payment on Payment Waiting Time for Outpatients With Medical Insurance: Historically Controlled Study

Evaluating Different Strategies on the Blood Collection Counter Settings to Improve Patient Waiting Time in Outpatient Units

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