Long term nurse scheduling via a decision support system based on linear integer programming: A case study at the University Hospital in Cagliari

A real case study is considered, namely the surgery department of the University Hospital in Cagliari, Italy. The scheduling resulting from the proposed approach is compared with that adopted by the hospital planner who currently computes it manually. It is also shown that in most of the cases, the proposed method finds out solutions not considered by the hospital planner, greatly reducing redundancies or weakness in the staff, and satisfying all the required constraints.