A solution method for treatment scheduling in rehabilitation hospitals with real-life requirements

2018 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 367-386 ◽  
Author(s):  
Liyang Xiao ◽  
Mahjoub Dridi ◽  
Amir Hajjam El Hassani ◽  
Wanlong Lin ◽  
Hongying Fei

Abstract In this study, we aim to minimize the total waiting time between successive treatments for inpatients in rehabilitation hospitals (departments) during a working day. Firstly, the daily treatment scheduling problem is formulated as a mixed-integer linear programming model, taking into consideration real-life requirements, and is solved by Gurobi, a commercial solver. Then, an improved cuckoo search algorithm is developed to obtain good quality solutions quickly for large-sized problems. Our methods are demonstrated with data collected from a medium-sized rehabilitation hospital in China. The numerical results indicate that the improved cuckoo search algorithm outperforms the real schedules applied in the targeted hospital with regard to the total waiting time of inpatients. Gurobi can construct schedules without waits for all the tested dataset though its efficiency is quite low. Three sets of numerical experiments are executed to compare the improved cuckoo search algorithm with Gurobi in terms of solution quality, effectiveness and capability to solve large instances.

2017 ◽  
Vol 116 ◽  
pp. 63-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Geng Sun ◽  
Yanheng Liu ◽  
Ming Yang ◽  
Aimin Wang ◽  
Shuang Liang ◽  
...  

Author(s):  
Surender Reddy Salkuti

<p>This paper solves an optimal reactive power scheduling problem in the deregulated power system using the evolutionary based Cuckoo Search Algorithm (CSA). Reactive power scheduling is a very important problem in the power system operation, which is a nonlinear and mixed integer programming problem. It optimizes a specific objective function while satisfying all the equality and inequality constraints. In this paper, CSA is used to determine the optimal settings of control variables such as generator voltages, transformer tap positions and the amount of reactive compensation required to optimize the certain objective functions. The CSA algorithm has been developed from the inspiration that the obligate brood parasitism of some Cuckoo species lay their eggs in nests of other host birds which are of other species. The performance of CSA for solving the proposed optimal reactive power scheduling problem is examined on standard Ward Hale 6 bus, IEEE 30 bus, 57 bus, 118 bus and 300 bus test systems. The simulation results show that the proposed approach is more suitable, effective and efficient compared to other optimization techniques presented in the literature.</p>


Author(s):  
Wenjie Wang ◽  
Congcong Chen ◽  
Yuting Cao ◽  
Jian Xu ◽  
Xiaohua Wang

Background: Dexterity is an important index for evaluating the motion performance of a robot. The size of the robot connecting rods directly affects the performance of flexibility. Objective: The purpose of this study is to provide an overview of optimal design methods from many pieces of literature and patents, and propose a new optimal design method for ensuring the robot completes its tasks flexibly and efficiently under workspace constraints. Methods: The kinematics and working space of the robot are analyzed to determine the range of motion of each joint. Then, a dexterity index is established based on the mean value of the global spatial condition number. Finally, an improved cuckoo algorithm is proposed, which changes the step size control factor with the number of iterations. Taking the dexterity index as the objective optimization function and the working radius as the constraint condition, the improved cuckoo search algorithm is used to optimize the size of the robot rod. Results: The improved cuckoo algorithm and proposed rod size optimized method are fully evaluated by experiments and comparative studies. The optimization design process shows that the proposed method has better solution accuracy and faster convergence speed. The optimized design results show that the robot's dexterity index has increased by 26.1%. Conclusion: The proposed method has better solution accuracy and faster convergence speed. The method was suitable for optimizing the rod parameters of the robot, and it was very meaningful to improve the motion performance of the robot.


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