Mohsen Jahangirian

Simulation in manufacturing and business: A review

This paper reports the results of a review of simulation applications published within peer-reviewed literature between 1997 and 2006 to provide an up-to-date picture of the role of simulation techniques within manufacturing and business. The review is characterised by three factors: wide coverage, broad scope of the simulation techniques, and a focus on real-world applications. A structured methodology was followed to narrow down the search from around 20,000 papers to 281. Results include interesting trends and patterns. For instance, although discrete event simulation is the most popular technique, it has lower stakeholder engagement than other techniques, such as system dynamics or gaming. This is highly correlated with modelling lead time and purpose. Considering application areas, modelling is mostly used in scheduling. Finally, this review shows an increasing interest in hybrid modelling as an approach to cope with complex enterprise-wide systems.

Simulation in health-care: lessons from other sectors

This paper compares the results of broad-range literature reviews over the period 1997–2006 on the application of simulation in three sectors: commerce, defence, and health-care. The main purpose of these reviews is to see whether there are lessons to learn from the first two sectors to be applied in the health-care sector. Results of our reviews show that, simulation has been commonly used in the three sectors; however, there is clear evidence of lack of consistency in the level of implementation. More specifically, healthcare lags behind the other two sectors, particularly in terms of stakeholder engagement and, consequently, in terms of implementation of simulation outcomes. This paper provides key insights into some challenges in applying simulation methods in healthcare, whilst presenting an up-to-date “big picture” of simulation in three main sectors from an academic point of view.

Cross‐sector analysis of simulation methods: a survey of defense and healthcare

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to see whether it is possible to learn any lessons from the application of simulation and modeling in the defense sector to be applied in the healthcare sector.Design/methodology/approach – Two comprehensive reviews are conducted within two domains of “Military & Aerospace” and “Healthcare”. A general search framework with common features is developed, while allowing rooms for customization for each domain. A common objective is set to cover a wide scope of simulation methods and application areas. Further, reviews are not restricted to a limited number of journals or conferences; rather the relevant databases are searched while using some filtering mechanisms.Findings – It is found that simulation has been commonly used in the defense sector(s). However, inconsistency in terms of the level of implementation in both the sectors is quite vivid. There is clear evidence that healthcare lags behind other sector(s), particularly in terms of stakeholder engagement and, con...

A rapid review method for extremely large corpora of literature: Applications to the domains of modelling, simulation, and management

While literature reviews with a large-scale scope are nowadays becoming a staple element of modern research practice, there are many challenges in taking on such an endeavour, yet little evidence of previous studies addressing these challenges exists. This paper introduces a practical and efficient review framework for extremely large corpora of literature, refined by five parallel implementations within a multi-disciplinary project aiming to map out the research and practice landscape of modelling, simulation, and management methods, spanning a variety of sectors of application where such methods have made a significant impact. Centred on searching and screening techniques along with the use of some emerging IT-assisted analytic and visualisation tools, the proposed framework consists of four key methodological elements to deal with the scale of the reviews, namely: (a) an incremental and iterative review structure, (b) a 3-stage screening phase including filtering, sampling and sifting, (c) use of visualisation tools, and (d) reference chasing (both forward and backward). Five parallel implementations of systematically conducted literature search and screening yielded a total initial search result of 146 087 papers, ultimately narrowed down to a final set of 1383 papers which was manageable within the limited time and other constraints of this research work.

Three critical challenges for modeling and simulation in healthcare

By most measures, the adoption of modeling and simulation techniques in healthcare service development falls well short of the uptake of such techniques evident in other sectors, such as business and commerce or aerospace and the military. The question is, why? To answer this, we consider three questions and then turn to the nature of answer which might lead towards greater adoption. The first is the vexed question of how good is good enough? The second concerns how best modeling should link through to decision-making; and the third concerns the culture needed to make the most of modeling and simulation (and whether it is worth the effort to make the transformation). From these, we draw an agenda for further enquiry in terms of stakeholders, their culture, data, and expectations, and the case in terms of value.

Causal study of low stakeholder engagement in healthcare simulation projects

Stakeholder engagement plays a fundamental role in the success of ‘operational research’ initiatives including simulation projects. However, there is little empirical evidence of real engagement in the context of healthcare simulation. This paper principally examines this issue and aims to provide insights into the possible causes. The paper reports on the results of a literature review and 10 field studies within the UK healthcare settings, supplemented with the authors’ experience in order to arrive at an initial list of the causes, which will then be tested through a survey of expert opinions. Twelve primary and 26 secondary causal factors, which received statistically significant level of agreement from the experts, are presented in a fish-bone diagram. The findings indicate that communication gap between simulation and stakeholder groups is the top primary factor contributing the most to the poor stakeholder engagement in healthcare simulation projects, followed by ‘poor management support’, ‘clinician’s high workload’ and ‘failure in producing tangible and quick results’.

Economics of modeling and simulation: reflections and implications for healthcare

Arguably, it is widely known that there is much activity in modeling & simulation (M&S) in healthcare, particularly in decision support and analysis for care delivery systems (CDS). This is supported by recent literature surveys. However, there is limited evidence of reported cost, success and impact. To attempt to investigate the so-called ‘economics’ of M&S in this area, this paper aims to depict a general picture of the economics of M&S supported by available evidence and to develop an initial set of guidelines using a novel framework that may assist decision makers in assessing the usefulness and cost-effectiveness of M&S. Our paper concludes with an urgent call for research in this area, specifically in terms of using standardized qualitative and quantitative methods to gather evidence for analysis and dissemination materials that ‘speak’ to government-level policy makers.

Integrated care development using systems modelling: a case study of intermediate care

In recent years more focus has been placed on integrated health and social care services within most western countries. Despite the reported importance of this area, it has not been explored enough in simulation research. Current modeling methods of healthcare systems focus on compartmentalized and specific specialties, such as emergency room modeling. Integrated care services, on the other hand, come with increased complexity, which makes it even more difficult for traditional modeling approaches to capture the desired level of detail. This article aims at identifying lessons for modeling complex integrated healthcare systems by presenting a case of intermediate care development using modeling. The main observations indicate that the involvement of stakeholders in a collaborative modeling should take precedence over model accuracy. Also iterative modeling is the most viable way to approach such systems; and that modelers should possess more skills than those needed for technical skills.

Key performance indicators for successful simulation projects

There are many factors that may contribute to the successful delivery of a simulation project. To provide a structured approach to assessing the impact various factors have on project success, we propose a top-down framework whereby 15 Key Performance Indicators (KPI) are developed that represent the level of successfulness of simulation projects from various perspectives. They are linked to a set of Critical Success Factors (CSF) as reported in the simulation literature. A single measure called Project’s Success Measure (PSM), which represents the project’s total success level, is proposed. The framework is tested against 9 simulation exemplar cases in healthcare and this provides support for its reliability. The results suggest that responsiveness to the customer’s needs and expectations, when compared with other factors, holds the strongest association with the overall success of simulation projects. The findings highlight some patterns about the significance of individual CSFs, and how the KPIs are used to identify problem areas in simulation projects.

Profiling e-health projects in Africa: trends and funding patterns:

There is a severe shortage of healthcare provision in Africa. e-Health, the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to support healthcare, may help to ease this problem. e-Health projects support a wide range of applications ranging from telemedicine to global research collaborations made possible via e-Infrastructures, worldwide systems of integrated advanced high performance networking and computing ICT. To try to understand the state of e-Health in Africa, this paper aims to create a picture and to present an analytical review of some of these initiatives in Africa. A review framework composed of multiple search methods is developed and applied to yield a broad coverage of e-Health projects over the African continent. Seven quantitative analyses on the projects are presented. Major observations include that there is a tendency for e-Health projects to grow in number in some African countries over time; that African countries with larger Gross National Incomes tend to attract more e-Health projects; that e-Health projects in Africa focus on telemedicine, health education and health-related research; that there is a wide range of funding bodies, some of which have a geographical focus, and that the number of m-Health projects has been rising sharply.