Patient scheduling in cancer treatment facilities

癌症治疗中心（CTF）的作用是为患有各种癌症并需要不同治疗方法的患者提供服务，以满足他们日益增长的需求。CTF管理人员在绩效方面面临若干挑战，例如省级中央管理获得专门服务的流程，该流程监测候诊名单上的个别患者。在魁北克省，放射肿瘤学的省级等待时间目标设定为4周（90%的患者），从决定治疗到治疗第一天之间的时间计算。放射肿瘤科必须同时为治疗性和姑息性患者提供不同的护理优先级别。以治愈目的治疗的患者占患者的70%。经过不同医疗保健专业人员参与的复杂治疗计划过程后，每周5天，每天提供5至44次治疗。其余30%的患者是姑息性的，需要迅速获得护理。患者流程中的错误是一个主要问题，因为它通常会导致治疗延误和取消，从而直接影响患者的健康。

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.