Influence of Open Access Scheduling Rules on Patient Demands

摘要

Open access scheduling was introduced to improve healthcare quality and reduce patient no-shows. However, the successful implementation of open access scheduling requires the match of healthcare provider capacity and patient demand on a daily basis. In this paper, we propose three patient demand models to analyze the effect of open access scheduling rules on patient demands. Based on these models, we analyze the patient demand change with the implementation of a simple open access scheduling rule. The results can be used to determine optimal open access scheduling rules to match daily provider capacity and patient demand.