Integrated planning for humanitarian and healthcare logistics

人道主义和医疗保健物流综合规划

• 批准号: RGPIN-2018-04609
• 负责人: AnayaArenas, AnaMaría
• 金额: $ 1.89万
• 依托单位: Université du Québec à Montréal
• 依托单位国家: 加拿大
• 项目类别: Discovery Grants Program - Individual
• 财政年份: 2020
• 资助国家: 加拿大
• 起止时间: 2020-01-01 至 2021-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nserc-crsng.gc.ca/ase-oro/Details-Detailles_eng.asp?id=712850
• 关键词: Integrated; planning; humanitarian; healthcare; logistics

Our world is in constant crisis and we need to serve our communities better. For this reason, humanitarian and healthcare logistics have gained increased attention from academics on operational research and management science (OR/MS) in the last ten years. Scientists are motivated by the definition of new and hard-to-solve optimization problems, as well as the positive impact sought from a practical standpoint. From one side, climate change, political conflicts and social disparities are causing damage everywhere. On the other side, (public) healthcare organizations need logistics to deliver healthcare services with resources that become scarcer each time, to a larger population (as is the case of countries with low income) or with large elderly communities (as in high income countries). In all cases, logistics play a key role in the delivery of help to people in need, when needed, as needed, and with efficacy, equity and efficiency. To plan and use a distribution network that responds to the challenges of humanitarian and healthcare organizations, OR/MS offers tools to support decision-making in problems such as network design, transportation planning and resource allocation. However, the particularities of these contexts call for new models and resolution tools, whether to plan a long-term logistics network (e.g., for humanitarian development or healthcare services), or to deploy their efforts only for a short period (e.g., disaster relief, temporary medical centers or blood collection units). My research program aims, in the long term, to provide a methodological framework to jointly plan and exploit distribution networks that optimize the use of resources, while achieving the goals of these organizations. To accomplish this long-term objective, in the next five years I propose to tackle four critical questions about integrated logistic planning that have yet to be addressed in the literature. First, I will study and identify common ground in distribution networks for humanitarian and healthcare logistics seeking research synergy in these domains. Second, I will investigate the integration of inventory management to the location routing problem, to provide planning tools capable of considering these three problems holistically. Third, I will create models and resolution tools to decide not only how to design the networks with a routing plan, but how to distribute the key resources (as vehicles or staff). Finally, I will investigate how to include other goals (equity, reliability) to the integrated planning approach, using multi-criterion optimization. This research program will contribute to the fields of logistics and optimization by expanding our understanding of integrated logistic planning. Moreover, it pursues a contribution to economic and social welfare by providing efficient decision support tools to real-life challenges from humanitarian and healthcare organizations.

我们的世界处于持续的危机之中，我们需要更好地为我们的社区服务。因此，在过去的十年里，人道主义和医疗保健物流越来越受到运筹学和管理科学（OR/MS）学者的关注。科学家们的动机是定义新的和难以解决的优化问题，以及从实践的角度寻求积极的影响。一方面，气候变化、政治冲突和社会差距正在各地造成破坏。另一方面，（公共）医疗保健组织需要物流来提供医疗保健服务，资源越来越稀缺，人口越来越多（如低收入国家的情况）或老年人社区越来越多（如高收入国家）。在所有情况下，物流在向有需要的人提供帮助方面发挥着关键作用，无论是在需要时，还是在需要时，都要有效力、公平和效率。 为了规划和使用响应人道主义和医疗保健组织挑战的配送网络，OR/MS提供了支持网络设计、运输规划和资源分配等问题决策的工具。然而，这些环境的特殊性需要新的模型和解决工具，无论是规划长期物流网络（例如，用于人道主义发展或医疗保健服务），或仅在短期内部署其努力（例如，救灾、临时医疗中心或采血单位）。 我的研究计划的目标是，从长远来看，提供一个方法框架，共同规划和利用分销网络，优化资源的使用，同时实现这些组织的目标。为了实现这一长期目标，在未来五年内，我建议解决四个关键问题的综合物流规划，还没有得到解决的文献。首先，我将研究和确定在这些领域寻求研究协同作用的人道主义和医疗物流配送网络的共同点。其次，我将研究整合库存管理的位置路由问题，提供规划工具，能够考虑这三个问题的整体。第三，我将创建模型和解决方案工具，不仅决定如何设计具有路由计划的网络，而且决定如何分配关键资源（如车辆或人员）。最后，我将研究如何使用多标准优化将其他目标（公平性、可靠性）纳入综合规划方法。这项研究计划将有助于物流和优化领域扩大我们对综合物流规划的理解。此外，它还通过为人道主义和医疗保健组织的现实生活挑战提供高效的决策支持工具，为经济和社会福利做出贡献。