Multiobjective study to implement outpatient appointment system at Hedi Chaker Hospital

The outpatient department at Hedi Chaker Hospital in Sfax, Tunisia, is currently using a block scheduling appointment whereby all patients are required to come at the beginning of the session. This brings about a tremendous waste of their time, creates congestion and puts further pressure on the medical staff. This paper evaluates a number of outpatient scheduling schemes based on the most recent research findings. Each model uses an appointment system scheme for scheduling with a well-performing appointment rule crossed with a sequencing rule. Environmental factors, such as the probability of no-shows and the probability of walk-ins, are included in the simulation of each of the different scenarios. Key measures of performance are determined for each of the different scenarios: waiting time in queues for each class of patients and resource utilisation. A Goal Programming Model is developed to choose the most appropriate schedule that optimizes the measures. Management preferences are incorporated to obtain a solution in line with their satisfaction.