Improving the health-care delivery process at hospital emergency services by a better use of inpatient bed information

Health-care delivery is a very special service process involving complex human activities and real-time decision making. Especially, emergency departments (EDs), as the gateway and the major source of outpatients in hospitals, have experienced yearly increase in patient visits and crowding, which jeopardizes quality of care. Based on a case study of emergency service delivery in a hospital, we propose and numerically test a solution making a better use of inpatient bed information. Finally, we propose directions for future research and some open questions. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.