Posted on November 19, 2024 by Wendy Frost
Arkajyoti Roy, assistant professor of management science and statistics, wanted to be a doctor growing up, but the dream ended quickly when he discovered he didn't like the sight of blood. Instead he obtained a doctorate in industrial engineering and focused his passion for health care into improving patient outcomes using optimization and data analytics.
Arkajyoti Roy
Collaborating with Dr. Frank Rosinia, professor of practice in management and former chair of anesthesiology at UT Health San Antonio, and Minghe Sun, professor of management science and statistics, Roy developed a model using optimization under uncertainty to improve provider scheduling. He applied the model within the UT Health San Antonio anesthesiology department.
“They were looking for an efficient way to schedule providers that would take into consideration their workloads, preferences as well as fluctuating demand for their services,” said Roy, who has also developed decision-making models in cancer radiotherapy.
“I wanted to develop a scheduling system that was fair, equitable, efficient and robust.”
Receiving over $400,000 in funding from UT Health San Antonio to roll out this project, Roy hired Kai Sun, a post-doctoral researcher, to work on site to manage the process.
Since launching the scheduling model, they have seen a 52% improvement in workload variability, a 10% increase in satisfaction and an 82% increase in time saved by the manual physician scheduler.
"From the beginning we wanted to make sure that we didn’t just create an abstract mathematical model, but a product that would meet the needs of the physicians," said Roy. "They’ve implemented the scheduling system and have already noticed significant improvements in workload while reducing the burden of the physician originally responsible for scheduling."
Looking to expand on his research, Roy’s goal is to standardize this product and implement it at other sites so the benefits can be seen across more departments, hospitals and providers.
“We’d like to make the system a little more user friendly and develop an interface that allows them to maintain it on their end,” he said.
Beyond the applied benefits from his work, Roy has published in top journals such as Productions and Operations Management and the Journal of Critical Care on this subject.
Roy’s data-driven work can be replicated in scenarios outside of health care as well to inform decision-making under uncertainty across any industry.
— Wendy Frost
