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Modular Petri net modeling of healthcare systems

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Abstract

This paper presents a modular approach for modeling healthcare systems using Petri nets. It is shown that a healthcare system can be constructed by different modules whose inputs and outputs are connected according to their geographical location. Each module can be modeled in two phases: (1) obtain the sequences of treatments and cares received by a patient in the case of a particular disease/condition, and (2) add the resources necessary to perform the previous sequences. The global model is obtained by fusion the inputs and outputs of the modules and by adding information on the patients. The constructed modules together with the resources are Petri nets belonging to a new subclass called healthcare Petri nets that is proved to have equivalent behavior with \(S^4{\textit{PR}}\) nets, a well-known class of Resource Allocation Systems. This allows us to apply the structural results already existing in the literature for \(S^4{\textit{PR}}\) to the context of healthcare systems. In order to illustrate the results, a case study of a public healthcare area in Zaragoza is considered as a use case.

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Notes

  1. t is a fork transition if \(|{t}^\cdot |>1\), i.e., t has more than one output place.

  2. t is a join transition if \(|\,^\cdot {t}|>1\), i.e., t has more than one input place.

  3. An implicit place is a place that by its removal the behavior of the net is not changed.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Aragón Institute of Engineering Research (I3A), University of Zaragoza, Zaragoza, Spain

    Cristian Mahulea & José Manuel Colom

  2. Servicio Aragonés de la Salud, Zaragoza, Spain

    Liliana Mahulea & Juan Manuel García Soriano

Authors
  1. Cristian Mahulea
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  2. Liliana Mahulea
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  3. Juan Manuel García Soriano
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  4. José Manuel Colom
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cristian Mahulea.

Additional information

This work has been partially supported by CICYT-FEDER Projects TIN2013-40809-R and DPI2014-57252-R. This work has been also co-financed by the Industry and Innovation Department of the Aragonese Goverment and European Social Funds (COSMOS and GISED Research Groups, refs. T93 and T27). It extends our previous results in Mahulea et al. (2012) and Mahulea et al. (2014).

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Mahulea, C., Mahulea, L., García Soriano, J.M. et al. Modular Petri net modeling of healthcare systems. Flex Serv Manuf J 30, 329–357 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10696-017-9283-9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10696-017-9283-9

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