A Generic Approach to Optimize a Blueprint Schedule for Multidisciplinary Group Therapy in Rehabilitation Care

Rehabilitation care consists of a wide variety of treatments organized in appointment series for individual and group therapy. Blueprint scheduling is a tactical approach to support appointment booking at the operational level. A blueprint schedule prescribes both the timing of group therapy sessions and the allocation of therapist and treatment room capacity to these sessions and thus defines which appointment types can be booked on which time slots. It facilitates providing treatment at the right time, by the right therapist(s), at a suitable location, and with a therapy load equally spread over day and week. This paper presents a structured generic approach for tactical capacity planning in multidisciplinary rehabilitation care. The generic approach includes optimization of a blueprint schedule using mixed-integer linear programming that was integrated in a decision support tool. We applied our approach in the rehabilitation center of Sint Maartenskliniek in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. The resulting blueprint schedule enables Sint Maartenskliniek to meet demand for rehabilitation care at the right time, by the right therapist(s), and at a suitable location while spreading the therapy load. Our approach can be applied in similar multidisciplinary care settings, potentially improving quality of care, quality of labor, and costs of care.