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•For who is game; Teaching Objectives
Introduction
This website contains in-depth information about the University of Twente Operating Room Manager Game.
The Operating Room Manager Game aims to give players insight into managing a large hospital’s Operating Room (OR) department at various levels of control, and the difficulties of applying Operations Research/Management Science techniques in healthcare. The players take on the role of management teams of an OR department, and in subsequent rounds follow the actual planning and scheduling process—starting with strategic choices on capacities for an upcoming year, and ending with daily, online planning of actual elective and emergency surgeries in each operating room—. The game ends with each team benchmarking and evaluating the strategies of all players. The game is motivated by the actual setting of a large academic hospital in the Netherlands, which also provided real-life data. A scientific paper about the Operating Room Manager Game has been submitted to INFORMS Transactions on Education for publication in a special issue on educational games.
For who is the game? Teaching Objectives
The Operating Room Manager Game can be played in various variants, ranging from a “small” variant where players use software where supportive planning, scheduling and simulation models and methods have already been implemented, to a “large” variant, where players have to design and implement these models and methods themselves. The former “small” variant is aimed at hospital practitioners (e.g. healthcare managers) or students that are not familiar with implementation of planning/scheduling/simulation techniques, or at players that want to play the game in a smaller time frame. The latter “large” variant requires more time, and is specifically aimed at students of Industrial Engineering and Management, Production and Logistics Management, or Healthcare Management.
The Operating Room Manager Game is currently used as part of the lecture “Optimization of Healthcare Processes” in the Industrial Engineering & Management master’s program at the University of Twente. These students are generally already familiar with operations management techniques such as Advanced Planning and Scheduling, Supply Chain and Transportation Management, Warehousing, Purchasing, etc. They are, however, not familiar with the healthcare application domain, and the complexity of a professional organization such as a hospital. This game thus integrates students’ foreknowledge regarding various OR/MS subjects, applied in a complex healthcare setting.
Software / tools
As discussed previously, this game can be played within a range of two “extreme” variants:
1.A “small” variant in a shorter time frame for which no knowledge is required regarding the implementation of advanced planning and scheduling techniques or simulation models. For this variant we have developed a Windows®-compatible program, in which all planning / scheduling / simulation / benchmarking techniques and models are integrated, and can be selected by the user. The use of this software involves a license fee. All information about this software can be found on this page.
2.A “large” variant in a longer time frame in which students have to implement the aforementioned techniques and models themselves. For this variant we use various auxiliary tools. More information regarding these tools, and useful downloads for instructors can be found on this page.
Of course, depending on the teaching objectives, any “in between” variant of the game can be played, where for some assignments tools are supplied, and for other assignments players have to implement these themselves.
Game assignments
For a description of the entire Operating Room Manager Game we refer to the scientific paper that has been submitted to INFORMS Transactions on Education for publication in a special issue on educational games. A link to this paper will be made available upon publication. The specific assignments that are handed out to the players can be found below. These are the assignments for the “large” version of the game:
•Assignment 1
•Assignment 2
•Assignment 3
•Assignment 4
If you intend to use the game, please let us know about your experiences.
Past results
Download the detailed results of the game, which was played during the winter 2006/2007 at University of Twente, here. After the students gave their presentation and did their DEA analysis to benchmark all players, each player (student group of 2 students) was asked to give their top 3 ranking of other players. The top 3 players consequently received 3, 2, or 1 point. The winner was the player with the most points. The results, and the MS Excel tool that was used to determine the winner can be downloaded here.
Contact information
For more information please contact the game developer:
Dr.ir. E.W. Hans
University of Twente
School of Management and Governance
Dep. Operational Methods for Production and Logistics
Room: E107 (Capitool 15)
P.O. Box 217
7500 AE Enschede
The Netherlands
Tel: (+31 53 489)3523/3912
Fax: (+31 53 489)2159
E-mail: e.w.hans@utwente.nl