Towards a centralised appointments system to optimise the length of patient stay

The progressive development of hospital environment requirements, as well as the new pressures hospital are subjected to, have forced healthcare systems to adapt their organisation. The pressures are mainly financial or stem from the patients' needs. The patients' check-up pathway is affected by this reorganisation, and so there is a need to study performance. In this paper, we explore models of the patient appointments system. This approach facilitates the development of algorithmic and mathematical tools to improve the system. On the one hand, the algorithmic tools construct the schedule of the day. On the other hand, the mathematical tools optimise these schedules. We analyse the performance of our tools taking three indicators into account: the average number of patients seen on a day, and two other criteria concerning patients' inconvenience. The tools described in this study make it possible to take the hospital decision makers' preferences when designing the appointment system.