Hospital Health Examination Scheduling Optimization using Genetic Algorithms

[[abstract]]健康檢查是指在身心都沒有異常症狀時做一些篩檢性的檢查，若發現一些不利健康的隱因或徵兆，可經由及早的處置，達到增進健康的目的。提供專業健康檢查的健康管理中心因欲而生，其依性別、年齡和特別的需求，將許多單項檢查組合成多種的套裝。由於受時間、人力與設備、先後順序與連續性等因素的限制，使得現行之健康檢查流程易導致受檢者聚積在某些造成瓶頸的診間（步驟）等候多時，而其它診間或儀器、設備、人員卻在同時間相對閒置，使得整個健康檢查時間因此變長，也造成醫療成本的增加與浪費。因此，一套有效率的健康檢查排程系統是有必要的。 綜觀國內外各大醫療機構，皆有安排受檢者健康檢查的方式與作法，文獻也多有探討相關議題，人工智慧的應用隨著電腦科技的進步日益精進，其中進化演算法在解決最佳化決策上已獲得非常多的成功案例，但是現有文獻多針對流程改進及醫療管理議題探討，雖有涉獵排程問題，但鮮有將進化技術與健康檢查排程作業結合之案例。因此，本研究提出應用遺傳基因演算法（Genetic Algorithm，GA）於健康管理中心的健康檢查排程作業，建構一個能有效突破目前作業方式限制之方法，期能達到縮短客人的等待時間，進而增進每日服務的人數之目的。 經與以啟發式演算法（heuristic algorithm）應用於北部某醫院健康管理中心的健康檢查排程作業進行比較，結果發現：本研究所提出之方法，無論從受檢者的角度或是從診間的角度平均都能有效減少健康檢查時間約3.0%及減少長時間等待檢查的機率約50%，如此不但可增加每日服務的人數及減少客戶抱怨機率，同時亦能使醫師更有效率服務健康檢查時間。[[abstract]]A health examination refers to the screening examination performed when no abnormal mental and physical symptoms are found. Its purpose is to increase health since some hidden causes or signs unfavorable for health can be discovered and treated early. Therefore, health management centers providing professional health examinations have been developed for this purpose, where many individual tests are assembled into various health examination packages according to gender, age, and specific needs. Due to the restrictions on factors such as time, manpower, facilities, service order, and continuity, current health examination procedures tend to waste the time of examinees at certain crowded clinics (or in time-consuming procedures), whereas other clinics, instruments, and devices are left unused and personnel lay aside. Such phenomenon prolongs the time required for the completion of an entire health examination, which also increases medical costs and wastes medical resources. Therefore, it is necessary to develop an efficient health examination scheduling system. In general, the medical institutions in Taiwan and abroad have all developed the methods and practices for scheduling examinees for health examinations, and relevant issues have been frequently investigated in literature. With the gradual progress in computer technology, the application of artificial intelligence has become common. One of the shining examples is the application of evolutionary algorithms, which has been successfully developed to optimize health examination scheduling in many medical institutions. However, there are only few medical institutions integrating the advanced technology with their health examination scheduling. Therefore, this study applied Genetic Algorithm (GA) to the operation of health examination scheduling in health management centers, in order to develop an approach which can effectively overcome the restrictions of the current operation. It was hoped that such approach could shorten examinees’ waiting time and achieve the purpose of increasing the daily number of examinees receiving services. The application of heuristic algorithm to health examination scheduling, which has been developed in the health management center at a certain hospital in northern Taiwan was compared with the approach proposed in this study. It was found that on average, the time spent on health examinations was significantly reduced by approximately 3.0%, and the probability for waiting was reduced by approximately 50% from either the perspective of examinees or clinics. This approach could increase the daily number of examinees receiving the service and reduce the probability of customer complaints, and enables physicians to provide services more efficiently during health examinations