Designing a bi-objective multi-echelon robust blood supply chain in a disaster

This paper presents a robust optimization model for designing a bi-objective multi-period supply chain network of blood in a disaster in three echelons, namely supply, processing, and distribution. The network consists of blood donors who donate blood at temporary and permanent blood donation facilities. Blood is collected and sent to blood centers for processing. The healthy blood will be sent to care centers depending on their demand and capacity. The aim of the proposed model is to determine the number and location of facilities and the best strategy to allocate them under three different scenarios, while the goals are to minimize costs and shortages of blood. The proposed model is formulated by a robust optimization approach. The application of the model is investigated using real data, which were collected from Qaemshahr city, Iran. The goal programming method was used to solve the problem. The results show that by expending an acceptable amount of budget, we can get ready for such a disaster situation.