Patient scheduling in cancer treatment facilities

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The role of the Cancer Treatment Facility (CTF) is to provide service to an increasing demand from patients who suffer from divers forms of cancer and require different kinds of treatment. CTF administrators face several challenges regarding performance, such as provincial central management process for access to specialized services, which monitor individual patients on the waiting list. In Quebec, the provincial waiting time target for radiation oncology is set to 4 weeks (for 90% of the patients) and it is calculated from the time elapsed between the decisions to treat to the first day of treatment. A radiation oncology department must serve both curative and palliative patients with different access to care priority levels. Patient treated with a curative intent account for 70% of patients. After a complex treatment planning process involving different healthcare professionals, treatments will be delivered on a daily basis, 5 days a week from 5 to 44 treatments. The remaining 30% of the patients are palliative and need rapid access to care. Errors in patient flows are a major concern as it can often lead to delays and cancellations of treatment, which directly affects patients' health.