Simulation of emergency department services: Karşiyaka State Hospital implementation

This study integrates simulation with optimization to design a decision support tool for the operation of an emergency department unit at a governmental hospital. Presented a methodology that uses system simulation combined with optimization to determine the optimal number of doctors, beds and nurses required to maximize patient throughput and to reduce patient time in the system subject to personnel staffing restrictions. The major objective of this decision supporting tool is to evaluate the impact of various staffing levels on service efficiency. Experimental results show that by using current hospital resources, the optimization simulation model generates optimal staffing and bed allocation that would allow an average of 28,27% reduction in patients? waiting time.