[Use of models and methods in operative research in dental technic].
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Dental Technicians↗
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Results for “Operations Research”
Explore indexed PubMed citations for clinical trials, systematic reviews and public health research. Read source abstracts and follow each citation to its original PubMed record.
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Training of personnel for health services operations research in Latin America.
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Allied Health Personnel↗
Journal selection decisions: a biomedical library operations research model. I. The framework.
The problem of deciding which journal titles to select for acquisition in a biomedical library is modeled. The approach taken is based on cost/benefit ratios. Measures of journal worth, methods of data collection, and journal cost data are considered. The emphasis is on the development of a practical process for selecting journal titles, based on the objectivity and rationality of the model; and on the collection of the approprate data and library statistics in a reasonable manner. The implications of this process towards an overall management information system (MIS) for biomedical serials handling are discussed.
Book Selection↗
Systematic serials selection analysis in a small academic health sciences library.
This paper describes the implementation of a straightforward quantitative technique to analyze the serials collection of the Medical Library at the University of Missouri-Kansas City (UMKC). Our simplified operations research approach resulted in a savings of nearly $1400 per year in subscriptions costs without reducing the net number of seven hundred titles or causing an imbalance in the subject distribution of our collection. By detailing both the rationale behind the process and the actual steps followed at UMKC, we hope to demonstrate that operations research techniques can be used practically and successfully even in small health sciences libraries. In the Appendix a more general and more rigorous operations research approach to the analysis of serials collections is also presented in a fashion that is, as far as possible, not mathematically forbidding.
Book Selection↗
[Institut de Recherches Cliniques of Montreal will establish a center of research on operational medicine and positive health].
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Academies and Institutes↗
[Thal's operation. Experimental research].
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Animals↗
[Efficiency in the delivery of health care].
In this paper the role of efficiency in health care delivery is discussed. In the first part several definitions of efficiency are presented and the most common efficiency analysis are described. In the second part of the paper some experiences aimed at improving the efficiency of health care delivery in England, Latin America and Mexico are discussed. Finally, the author presents four proposals for the improvement of efficiency of health care delivery in Mexico: monetary reward associated to performance, alternative organization of health services, investment in management training for health manpower, and operational research in the health systems.
Delivery of Health Care↗
Overview: epidemiology of malaria and its control in countries of the WHO South-East Asia region.
The malaria situation in the WHO South-East Asia Region is reviewed in terms of its epidemiological diversity, problems encountered and implications for control. Varying host-parasite-vector interrelationships are shown to be influenced significantly by prevailing environmental conditions (eg topographic, climatic) as well as behavioral and socio-economic determinants. Drug-resistant falciparum malaria and vector resistance to insecticides are the main biological deterrents to the success of control programs. Thus, the potential for malaria transmission remains high in many places. The malaria control strategy includes Primary Health Care and integration with basic health services. However, operational research is needed in many of the countries in the Region.
Asia, Southeastern↗
A clinical and research database management system for a geriatric nursing outreach program to rural elderly: purpose and general structure.
The need to systematically and comprehensively manage data to support nursing services asserts itself in all areas and contexts where nursing services are delivered to patients and families. While most applications have targeted inpatient nursing services, several systems to sustain ambulatory nursing care have been proposed as well. In this paper, we outline the purpose and general structure of a custom-designed computerized database management system to support the clinical, administrative, and research operations of a geriatric nursing outreach program in rural Virginia.
Aged↗
Maternal health and the measurement trap.
This paper focuses on the contribution of measurement-related factors to the neglect of maternal health in resource allocation for programmes and in public health research. As the recent interest in maternal health has now progressed beyond the need for information primarily for the purpose of advocacy, measurement-related factors have emerged as powerful constraints on programme action. Three outstanding needs for information can be identified: first, to establish the levels and trends of specific maternal health outcomes; secondly, to identify the characteristics and determinants of health outcomes; and thirdly, to monitor and evaluate the effectiveness of programmes designed to influence health outcomes. In order to meet these needs, the emphasis placed on operational research by the current major initiatives in maternal health must be complemented by an equivalent emphasis on methodological studies. The call for improved information by international and national agencies should be made in unison with the call for action. Inadequate information is a reality that has to be faced throughout the world, but particularly in developing countries. The quality, quantity and scope of health-related data are the elements of this inadequacy and may be discussed in terms of four factors: the indicators, the data sources, the measurement techniques, and the conceptual framework. In this paper, the neglect of maternal health and the lack of information are shown to be self-reinforcing and constitute a measurement trap sprung by these four factors. Dismantling this trap has revealed a weak conceptual framework to lie at the very centre. Maternal health has tended to be conceptualized as a discrete, negative state, characterized by physical rather than social or mental manifestations, and by a narrow time-perspective focusing on pregnancy, delivery and the puerperium. The need to broaden this perspective and to develop equally broad operational definitions represent important steps forward that must be taken.
Developing Countries↗
A system for labeling and control of toxic materials in a large research facility.
For large industrial and research operations, maintaining reasonable control of all toxic materials used in their operations can be a formidable task. A system utilizing cards has been developed which serves a dual purpose - informing the user regarding hazards of a particular material and also facilitating appropriate workplace surveillance during its use. Selected data is printed on the card. The card contains a label which the user detaches and affixes to the container. This label classifies the material according to flammability, toxicity, reactivity and special properties on a 0 through 4 hazard rating system.
Computers↗
Theory of chaperonin action: inertial model for enhancement of prokaryotic Rubisco assembly.
We have performed a computational simulation of the aggregation and chaperonin-dependent reconstitution of dimeric prokaryotic ribulose bisphosphate carboxylase/oxygenase (Rubisco), based on the data of P. Goloubinoff et al. (1989, Nature 342, 884-889) and P. V. Viitanen et al. (1990, Biochemistry 29, 5665-5671). The aggregation is simulated by a set of 12 differential equations representing the aggregation of the Rubisco folding intermediate, Rubisco-I, with itself and with aggregates of Rubisco-I, leading up to dodecamers. Four rate constants, applying to forward or reverse steps in the aggregation process, were included. Optimal values for these constants were determined using the ellipsoid algorithm as implemented by one of us (Ecker, J.G. & Kupferschmid, M., 1988, Introduction to Operations Research, Wiley, New York, pp. 315-322). Intensive exploration of simpler aggregation models did not identify an alternative that could simulate the data as well as this one. The activity of the chaperonin in this system was simulated by using this aggregation model, combined with a model similar to that proposed by Goloubinoff et al. (1989). The model assumes that the chaperonin can bind the folding intermediate rapidly, and that the chaperonin complex releases the Rubisco molecule slowly, permitting time for its spontaneous folding while interacting with the chaperonin. This is followed by self-association of the folded Rubisco monomer to yield the active dimeric Rubisco. A modification of the model that simulates temperature effects was also constructed. The most important results we obtained indicate that the chaperonin-dependent reconstitution of Rubisco can be simulated adequately without invoking any catalysis of folding by the chaperonin. In addition, the simulations predict values for the association rate constant of Rubisco-I with the chaperonin, and other variables, that are subject to experimental verification.
Chaperonins↗
An overview of a hierarchy of planning models for Regional Blood Bank Management.
Optimal regionalization of a blood banking system requires a hierarchical structure based on an analysis of preexisting elements in the region to determine at what level of activity economics of scale, cost effectiveness and efficiency will be greatest. We have applied operations research techniques to segments of the blood service complex. This paper is an overview of the general results of this research. From analysis of the data in each segment, a mathematical response function is developed for such managerial processes as demand forecasting, requirements computation, crossmatch and recycle control at each level of the hierarchy in a regional system. These processes in independent hospital blood banks are contrasted with those in hospital blood banks and transfusion services which are dependent on central blood banks for their supply. An example is presented of a model which is useful in the planning of a regional system. Implementation of these hierarchical models in hospital blood banks can reduce outdating, size of inventories and shortage. In central blood banks, these models can minimize shipment quantities, determine optimal transshipments and the most efficient routing.
Blood Banks↗
Designing a comprehensive service for a health care group: a framework for planning.
This article describes an exercise which was designed by a multidisciplinary group, including a community physician, health economist, clinician and operational research practitioner, to explore the essential nature of planning services for a particular health care group. The first programme, described in the article, was concerned with psychogeriatric services, including both community and hospital provision, but it is indicated that the exercise can be adapted to all other services, and has already been used to evolve a comprehensive accident and emergency service in a particular health area. Participants came from a wide variety of disciplines, including community medicine, psychiatry, geriatrics, hospital and community nursing and non-medical administration. The tutors to the course were those who had been involved in its planning and they spent the time working with the participants to explore the concepts involved and to produce some practical solutions that could be used in the field.
Decision Making↗
Formulating therapeutic objectives as a prelude to program evaluation.
The author emphasizes the need for more precise formulation of goals for mental health treatment programs. He describes the Veterans Administration's five-year effort at goal formulation using ideas borrowed from operations research and education. With goals from various VA programs as examples, he illustrates how goal statements can be written with more specificity. He also describes how matching rating-scale items can be developed to measure the degree to which each goal is being met.
Evaluation Studies as Topic↗
Truncated Poisson distribution with optimization techniques in the epidemiology of caries.
A truncated Poisson distribution provides a closer fit to observed caries in a sample of 10- to 11-year-old children than a previously reported chain binomial distribution. Operations research techniques are used in estimating a parameter.
Child↗
A preliminary report of an out-patient systems study in Sri Lanka.
Out-patient medical clinics in Sri Lanka often have long queues of patients waiting to see a doctor partly due to a shortage of doctors. To apply operational research techniques to optimize the functioning of the clinic, an initial step is to determine the distributional pattern of patient arrival times and the doctors' service times. The results showed that the arrival times of patients were time dependent. However, analysis of half-hourly data of inter-arrival times showed a negative exponential distribution. The doctor's service time varied from doctor to doctor and whether new or follow up patients were being seen. Each of the service times seemed to fit into an Erlangian distribution.
Appointments and Schedules↗
Pre-registration house appointments: a computer aided allocation scheme.
The number of pre-registration house posts allocated by the London Hospital rapidly increased in 1973. This made solution by hand of the allocation problem time consuming and complex. The Operational Research Unit was approahced and a computer aided scheme was designed which was subsequently adopted. Various alternative allocation methods are discussed and examples given. The results of the first five allocations are presented. The percentage of applicants obtaining one of their first three choices varied from 61 to 70%. Of consultants who expressed a choice, the percentage obtaining one of their first three choices was in the range of 72-94%. The allocation scheme has two principal advantages over methods used elsewhere. It is extremely flexible, allowing various weights to be given to either applicant or consultant. It also produces a complete solution which is optimal in terms of the numerical criteria specified. Details of the assignment algorithm are given in the Appendix.
Computers↗