Multi-objective mathematical model for order quantity allocation in multiple discount environments for healthcare supply chain

摘要

Health services and private medical agencies have started to demand measurable value for money and there has been a change in attitude amongst many medical practitioners, who have realised that some economic tools can help them carry out their work more effectively. This paper deals with order quantity and vendor allocation model to determine the number of blood product vendors to be employed and order quantities to be allocated to those blood product vendors for procurement of multiple blood products in either a local buying or centralised buying environment under multiple discount environments for a hospital-based blood bank. We formulate the problem as a multi-objective mixed integer linear programming model for the allocation of blood product vendors. Based on the model, we also developed a decision support system (DSS) for ease of use. The model is tested for a real life case study and also validated by comparison with the complete enumeration.