IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/inm/ormnsc/v49y2003i12p1739-1752.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Resource Allocation in Multisite Service Systems with Intersite Customer Flows

Author

Listed:
  • Xiuli Chao

    (Department of Industrial Engineering and Interdisciplinary OR Programs, North Carolina State University, 325 Riddick, Raleigh, North Carolina 27695)

  • Liming Liu

    (Department of Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China)

  • Shaohui Zheng

    (Department of Information and Systems Management, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China)

Abstract

Motivated by a project in health-care management, we study the resource allocation problem in multisite service systems with intersite customer flows. We aim at providing insights to and guidelines for resource allocation in these service systems when some service criterion, such as average waiting time, loss rate, or blocking probability, is a major concern. We develop analytical optimization models and from them we obtain the explicit optimal allocation policy. Our results demonstrate that the optimal resource allocation solution exhibits a structure of "one large and many small."

Suggested Citation

  • Xiuli Chao & Liming Liu & Shaohui Zheng, 2003. "Resource Allocation in Multisite Service Systems with Intersite Customer Flows," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(12), pages 1739-1752, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:49:y:2003:i:12:p:1739-1752
    DOI: 10.1287/mnsc.49.12.1739.25110
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1287/mnsc.49.12.1739.25110
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1287/mnsc.49.12.1739.25110?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bennett Fox, 1966. "Discrete Optimization Via Marginal Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 13(3), pages 210-216, November.
    2. Chrwan-Jyh Ho & Hon-Shiang Lau, 1992. "Minimizing Total Cost in Scheduling Outpatient Appointments," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 38(12), pages 1750-1764, December.
    3. Linda V. Green & Debashis Guha, 1995. "Note: On the Efficiency of Imbalance in Multi-Facility Multi-Server Service Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 41(1), pages 179-187, January.
    4. Stefanos A. Zenios & Glenn M. Chertow & Lawrence M. Wein, 2000. "Dynamic Allocation of Kidneys to Candidates on the Transplant Waiting List," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 48(4), pages 549-569, August.
    5. J. George Shanthikumar & David D. Yao, 1987. "Optimal Server Allocation in a System of Multi-Server Stations," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 33(9), pages 1173-1180, September.
    6. Alan J. Rolfe, 1971. "A Note on Marginal Allocation in Multiple-Server Service Systems," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 17(9), pages 656-658, May.
    7. Gernot Tragler & Jonathan P. Caulkins & Gustav Feichtinger, 2001. "Optimal Dynamic Allocation of Treatment and Enforcement in Illicit Drug Control," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 49(3), pages 352-362, June.
    8. Roy A. Carr-Hill & Geoffrey Hardman & Stephen Martin & Stuart Peacock & Trevor A. Sheldon & Peter C. Smith, 1997. "A New Formula for Distributing Hospital Funds in England," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 27(1), pages 53-70, February.
    9. Prashant C. Fuloria & Stefanos A. Zenios, 2001. "Outcomes-Adjusted Reimbursement in a Health-Care Delivery System," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 47(6), pages 735-751, June.
    10. Frederick S. Hillier & Kut C. So, 1996. "On the Simultaneous Optimization of Server and Work Allocations in Production Line Systems with Variable Processing Times," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 44(3), pages 435-443, June.
    11. Kathryn E. Stecke & James J. Solberg, 1985. "The Optimality of Unbalancing Both Workloads and Machine Group Sizes in Closed Queueing Networks of Multiserver Queues," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 33(4), pages 882-910, August.
    12. Jae-Hyeon Ahn & John C. Hornberger, 1996. "Involving Patients in the Cadaveric Kidney Transplant Allocation Process: A Decision-Theoretic Perspective," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 42(5), pages 629-641, May.
    13. Wilson, Richard M. & Gibberd, R. W., 1990. "Allocating resources between health care regions: Catchment populations and allocating for equity," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 49(3), pages 333-347, December.
    14. Kut C. So & Christopher S. Tang, 2000. "Modeling the Impact of an Outcome-Oriented Reimbursement Policy on Clinic, Patients, and Pharmaceutical Firms," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 46(7), pages 875-892, July.
    15. Hau Leung Lee & Morris A. Cohen, 1985. "Multi-Agent Customer Allocation in a Stochastic Service System," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 31(6), pages 752-763, June.
    16. Joel M. Calabrese, 1992. "Optimal Workload Allocation in Open Networks of Multiserver Queues," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 38(12), pages 1792-1802, December.
    17. Yves Dallery & Kathryn E. Stecke, 1990. "On the Optimal Allocation of Servers and Workloads in Closed Queueing Networks," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 38(4), pages 694-703, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Jónas Oddur Jónasson & Sarang Deo & Jérémie Gallien, 2017. "Improving HIV Early Infant Diagnosis Supply Chains in Sub-Saharan Africa: Models and Application to Mozambique," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 65(6), pages 1479-1493, December.
    2. Marquinez, José Tomás & Sauré, Antoine & Cataldo, Alejandro & Ferrer, Juan-Carlos, 2021. "Identifying proactive ICU patient admission, transfer and diversion policies in a public-private hospital network," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 295(1), pages 306-320.
    3. Ursavas, Evrim & Zhu, Stuart X., 2016. "Optimal policies for the berth allocation problem under stochastic nature," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 255(2), pages 380-387.
    4. Zhang, Yue & Atkins, Derek, 2019. "Medical facility network design: User-choice and system-optimal models," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 273(1), pages 305-319.
    5. Li, Na & Zhang, Yue & Teng, De & Kong, Nan, 2021. "Pareto optimization for control agreement in patient referral coordination," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 101(C).
    6. Morabito, Reinaldo & de Souza, Mauricio C. & Vazquez, Mariana, 2014. "Approximate decomposition methods for the analysis of multicommodity flow routing in generalized queuing networks," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 232(3), pages 618-629.
    7. David Dreyfus & Anand Nair & Srinivas Talluri, 2020. "The Impact of Chain Organization Size on Efficiency and Quality of Affiliated Facilities—Implications for Multi‐Unit Organizational Forms," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 29(7), pages 1605-1623, July.
    8. Patriksson, Michael & Strömberg, Christoffer, 2015. "Algorithms for the continuous nonlinear resource allocation problem—New implementations and numerical studies," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 243(3), pages 703-722.
    9. Li, Zhong-Ping & Chang, Aichih (Jasmine) & Zou, Zongbao, 2023. "Design mechanism to coordinate a hierarchical healthcare system: Patient subsidy vs. capacity investment," Omega, Elsevier, vol. 118(C).
    10. B. L. Garcia & R. Bekker & R. D. Mei & N. H. Chavannes & N. D. Kruyt, 2021. "Optimal patient protocols in regional acute stroke care," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 24(3), pages 515-530, September.
    11. Dongyang Wang & Kumar Muthuraman & Douglas Morrice, 2019. "Coordinated Patient Appointment Scheduling for a Multistation Healthcare Network," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 67(3), pages 599-618, May.
    12. Li, Zhong-Ping & Wang, Jian-Jun, 2021. "Effects of healthcare quality and reimbursement rate in a hospital association," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    13. Vikram Tiwari & H. Heese, 2009. "Specialization and competition in healthcare delivery networks," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 306-324, September.
    14. Refael Hassin & Yair Y. Shaki & Uri Yovel, 2015. "Optimal service‐capacity allocation in a loss system," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(2), pages 81-97, March.
    15. X. Tang & S. Fang & F. Cheng, 2014. "Strategic interactions in service supply chain with horizontal competition," TOP: An Official Journal of the Spanish Society of Statistics and Operations Research, Springer;Sociedad de Estadística e Investigación Operativa, vol. 22(2), pages 469-488, July.
    16. Gülpınar, Nalan & Çanakoğlu, Ethem & Branke, Juergen, 2018. "Heuristics for the stochastic dynamic task-resource allocation problem with retry opportunities," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 266(1), pages 291-303.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Refael Hassin & Yair Y. Shaki & Uri Yovel, 2015. "Optimal service‐capacity allocation in a loss system," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 62(2), pages 81-97, March.
    2. Benjaafar, Saifallah, 1995. "Performance bounds for the effectiveness of pooling in multi-processing systems," European Journal of Operational Research, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 375-388, December.
    3. Frenk, J.B.G. & Labbé, M. & van Vliet, M. & Zhang, S., 1994. "Improved algorithms for machine allocation in manufacturing systems," Econometric Institute Research Papers 11742, Erasmus University Rotterdam, Erasmus School of Economics (ESE), Econometric Institute.
    4. J. Smith, 2015. "Optimal workload allocation in closed queueing networks with state dependent queues," Annals of Operations Research, Springer, vol. 231(1), pages 157-183, August.
    5. Michelle Opp & Kevin Glazebrook & Vidyadhar G. Kulkarni, 2005. "Outsourcing warranty repairs: Dynamic allocation," Naval Research Logistics (NRL), John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(5), pages 381-398, August.
    6. Bitran, Gabriel R. & Morabito, Reinaldo., 1994. "Open queueing networks : optimization and performance evaluation models for discrete manufacturing systems," Working papers 3743-94., Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Sloan School of Management.
    7. Subba Rao, S. & Gunasekaran, A. & Goyal, S. K. & Martikainen, T., 1998. "Waiting line model applications in manufacturing," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(1), pages 1-28, January.
    8. Oguzhan Alagoz & Lisa M. Maillart & Andrew J. Schaefer & Mark S. Roberts, 2007. "Determining the Acceptance of Cadaveric Livers Using an Implicit Model of the Waiting List," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 55(1), pages 24-36, February.
    9. Anil Aswani & Zuo-Jun Max Shen & Auyon Siddiq, 2019. "Data-Driven Incentive Design in the Medicare Shared Savings Program," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 67(4), pages 1002-1026, July.
    10. Houyuan Jiang & Zhan Pang & Sergei Savin, 2012. "Performance-Based Contracts for Outpatient Medical Services," Manufacturing & Service Operations Management, INFORMS, vol. 14(4), pages 654-669, October.
    11. Sahar Ahmadvand & Mir Saman Pishvaee, 2018. "An efficient method for kidney allocation problem: a credibility-based fuzzy common weights data envelopment analysis approach," Health Care Management Science, Springer, vol. 21(4), pages 587-603, December.
    12. Pengfei Guo & Christopher S. Tang & Yulan Wang & Ming Zhao, 2019. "The Impact of Reimbursement Policy on Social Welfare, Revisit Rate, and Waiting Time in a Public Healthcare System: Fee-for-Service Versus Bundled Payment," Service Science, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 154-170, January.
    13. Oguzhan Alagoz & Lisa M. Maillart & Andrew J. Schaefer & Mark S. Roberts, 2004. "The Optimal Timing of Living-Donor Liver Transplantation," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 50(10), pages 1420-1430, October.
    14. Zahra Gharibi & Michael Hahsler, 2021. "A Simulation-Based Optimization Model to Study the Impact of Multiple-Region Listing and Information Sharing on Kidney Transplant Outcomes," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(3), pages 1-20, January.
    15. Fainman, Emily Zhu & Kucukyazici, Beste, 2020. "Design of financial incentives and payment schemes in healthcare systems: A review," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 72(C).
    16. Li, Zhong-Ping & Wang, Jian-Jun, 2021. "Effects of healthcare quality and reimbursement rate in a hospital association," Socio-Economic Planning Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    17. Kargar, Bahareh & Pishvaee, Mir Saman & Jahani, Hamed & Sheu, Jiuh-Biing, 2020. "Organ transportation and allocation problem under medical uncertainty: A real case study of liver transplantation," Transportation Research Part E: Logistics and Transportation Review, Elsevier, vol. 134(C).
    18. Burhaneddin Sandıkçı & Lisa M. Maillart & Andrew J. Schaefer & Oguzhan Alagoz & Mark S. Roberts, 2008. "Estimating the Patient's Price of Privacy in Liver Transplantation," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 56(6), pages 1393-1410, December.
    19. Barış Ata & Anton Skaro & Sridhar Tayur, 2017. "OrganJet: Overcoming Geographical Disparities in Access to Deceased Donor Kidneys in the United States," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(9), pages 2776-2794, September.
    20. Kochel, Peter, 1996. "On queueing models for some multi-location problems," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(1-3), pages 429-433, August.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:inm:ormnsc:v:49:y:2003:i:12:p:1739-1752. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Chris Asher (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/inforea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.