Operations Research and Health Care

1. Public Policy and Economic Analysis

   1. Decision Making for Bioterror Preparedness: Examples from Smallpox Vaccination Policy

      • Edward H. Kaplan, Lawrence M. Wein

      Pages 519-536

   2. Models for Kidney Allocation

      • Stefanos A. Zenios

      Pages 537-554

   3. Planning in the Face of Politics: Reshaping Children’s Health Services in Inner London

      • Mike Cushman, Jonathan Rosenhead

      Pages 555-592

2. Clinical Applications

   1. Modeling Medical Treatment Using Markov Decision Processes

      • Andrew J. Schaefer, Matthew D. Bailey, Steven M. Shechter, Mark S. Roberts

      Pages 593-612

   2. Dynamic Influence Diagrams: Applications to Medical Decision Modeling

      • Gordon B. Hazen

      Pages 613-638

   3. Assessment of the Benefits of Anesthesia Patient Risk Reduction Measures

      • M. Elisabeth Paté-Cornell

      Pages 639-657

   4. An Asthma Policy Model

      • A. David Paltiel, Karen M. Kuntz, Scott T. Weiss, Anne L. Fuhlbrigge

      Pages 659-693

   5. A Bayesian Network to Assist Mammography Interpretation

      • Daniel L. Rubin, Elizabeth S. Burnside, Ross Shachter

      Pages 695-720

   6. Optimization and Decision Support in Brachytherapy Treatment Planning

      • Eva K. Lee, Marco Zaider

      Pages 721-740

   7. Radiotherapy Treatment Design and Linear Programming

      • Allen Holder

      Pages 741-774

   8. Optimization Tools for Radiation Treatment Planning in Matlab

      • Michael C. Ferris, Jinho Lim, David M. Shepard

      Pages 775-806

   9. Transmission Model Analysis of Nontypeable Haemophilus Influenzae

      • James S. Koopman, Ximin Lin, Stephen E. Chick, Janet R. Gilsdorf

      Pages 807-837

   10. The Impact of Novel Treatments on Aβ Burden in Alzheimer’s Disease: Insights from A Mathematical Model

       • David L. Craft, Lawrence M. Wein, Dennis J. Selkoe

       Pages 839-865

3. Back Matter

   Pages 867-874

   PDF

In both rich and poor nations, public resources for health care are inadequate to meet demand. Policy makers and health care providers must determine how to provide the most effective health care to citizens using the limited resources that are available. This chapter describes current and future challenges in the delivery of health care, and outlines the role that operations research (OR) models can play in helping to solve those problems. The chapter concludes with an overview of this book – its intended audience, the areas covered, and a description of the subsequent chapters. KEY WORDS Health care delivery, Health care planning HEALTH CARE DELIVERY: PROBLEMS AND CHALLENGES 3 1.1 WORLDWIDE HEALTH: THE PAST 50 YEARS Human health has improved significantly in the last 50 years. In 1950, global life expectancy was 46 years [1]. That figure rose to 61 years by 1980 and to 67 years by 1998 [2]. Much of these gains occurred in low- and middle-income countries, and were due in large part to improved nutrition and sanitation, medical innovations, and improvements in public health infrastructure.

• Assessment
• Data-Envelopment-Analysis
• Operations Research
• Public Health
• Radiologieinformationssystem
• Scheduling
• Simulation
• calculus
• diagnosis
• linear optimization
• modeling

From the reviews:

"The three editors … aim this book at a broad audience that includes OR practitioners and researchers with interests in healthcare, as well as healthcare practitioners. The editors set out in this book to provide a comprehensive reference on the applicability of operations research techniques, tools and theories to a wide range of issues and problems in healthcare. … it is worthwhile to have a copy in the library as a useful reference to the many ways that OR could be applied in healthcare." (T Burgess, Journal of the Operational Research Society, Vol. 57, 2006)

• Stanford University, USA

  Margaret L. Brandeau

• Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

  François Sainfort

• University of California at Los Angeles, USA

  William P. Pierskalla

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