BUSN9660 Simulation Modelling Individual Simulation Project Brief | UOK

1. Background of BUSN9660

Following a marked increase in the number of people diagnosed with type 2 diabetes in Kent, a new specialised unit called the Kent Diabetes Centre (KDC) has just been created at William Harvey Hospital in Ashford. The aim of the unit is to provide specialised treatment and general health and life style advice to patients with diabetes or those  suspected of having the disease, but who have not yet been formally diagnosed. Dr West, an eminent endocrinologist, has been appointed as the Director of KDC. Given, the important role the centre is expected to play managing patients with diabetes in Kent, Dr West would like to run the centre as efficiently as possible. A few years ago she attended a presentation on the benefits of using simulation modelling in health management and was extremely impressed. She would like you to build a simulation model of KDC and advise her on the best way to manage the centre.

Dr West has provided you with the following information about current operational processes at KDC.

• Patients arrive at KDC between 08:00 and 20:00 Monday to Saturday. During the morning period from 08:00 to 12:00, 6 patients arrive, on average, every hour. From 12:00 to 16:00, this average decreases by 50% compared to the morning. However, a considerable number of patients come to KDC after work and, as a result, the average arrival rate increases by 100% from 16:00 to 20:00 compared to the morning.
• Upon arrival, patients go through a registration process, which takes place at the reception desk, which is currently manned by 1 receptionist. Data has been collected but not statistically analysed with regard to the time it takes to register a patient. This data has been provided to you by Dr West in an Excel file for you to determine an appropriate probability distribution for reception service time (e.g. using Stat::Fit or some other distribution fitting software). It is important to note that 10% of patients come from the intensive care unit at the hospital and these patients get priority at the reception and any other diagnosis and treatment activities within KDC.
• Blood is then taken from the patient for testing. This is performed by one of the 4 nurses at the KDC. This process takes around 5 minutes. The blood samples are then sent to the laboratory to determine the glucose level of the blood. This process follows a normal distribution with a mean of 20 minutes and a standard deviation of 3 minutes. Note that there are 2 lab specialists employed at KDC, whose job it is to perform testing of blood samples.
• After blood is taken from the patients, they proceed to a diagnosis consultation with a diabetes consultant. This takes between 15 and 30 minutes. During the consultation, patients must be matched with their blood test results so that a correct diagnosis can be made. There are 4 diabetes consultants currently working at HKDC. At the end of the consultation, patients are divided into 3 categories: “Pre Diabetic”, “Drug Based Diabetic”, and “Insulin Based Diabetic”. Data collected in the past suggest that patients divide up 30%, 40%, and 30% into these categories, respectively.
• After consultation, “Pre Diabetic” patients are directed to a session with the only junior doctor at KDC. During the session, patients receive advice on how to manage their condition and avoid progressing to the diabetes stage. This session lasts 20 minutes on average. Before leaving KDC, these patients are given a leaflet to take with them. There are 150 leaflets available at the beginning of every day. It is important to note that these patients will not wait for more than 15 minutes before meeting the junior Doctor. If the waiting time exceeds 15 minutes, they leave KDC without going to the advice session.
• “Drug Based Diabetic” patients have a treatment session, which is divided into 2 phases. Phase 1 takes place with a diabetes nurse has a duration that is normally distributed with a mean of 10 minutes and a standard deviation of 2 minutes. Phase 2 is run by a diabetes consultant, which takes between 15 and 45 minutes with 30 minutes being the most likely. Once this is finished, patients wait to get an appointment for their next visit. This process takes 3-5 minutes and is performed by one of 2 patient administrators employed by KDC.
• “Insulin Based Diabetic” patients get an extended session, which lasts anywhere between 60 and 75 minutes. The session involves both a diabetes consultant and a diabetes nurse. There are 4 diabetes nurses currently employed at KDC. At the end of session, patients wait to be given the date of their next appointment, which takes 4 to 7 minutes and is performed by a patient administrator. During this process, every patient is given a pack of insulin injections. The stock of insulin injection packs is 150 at the start of every day.
• The day is divided into three shifts: the “Morning Shift” 08:00-12:00, the “Afternoon Shift” 12:00-16:00, and the “Evening Shift” 16:00-20:00. The availability of staff during these shifts and hourly pay rates are shown in the table below.

• KDC has the following targets it would like to satisfy. The first two targets should be met by 95% of patients.

1. Patients should wait no more than 15 minutes before being dealt with at reception.
2. “Drug Based” and “Insulin Based” patients should leave KDC no more than 120 minutes after arrival.
3. All “Pre Diabetic” should get a leaflet and all “Insulin Based” patients should get an insulin injection pack before leaving KDC.
4. The daily cost of employing staff should be under £5000 and preferably nearer £3500.

Your task is to construct a computer simulation model of the current service and advise Dr West on changes to staffing and the number leaflets and insulin injection packs that are needed to achieve the targets above. Think carefully about what happens to patients at the end of the day. For patients who are only part of the way through the process at 20:00, do they complete the process, go home, wait overnight? Use common sense. If there is anything else you are unsure of, make a sensible assumption and explain it in your report.

2. Instructions of BUSN9660 

The deadline for the project is 12:00 Monday 12 May 2025. You must prepare a report for Dr West. The main body of the report (the executive summary) should not exceed 6 typed pages of A4 paper (11 point font, single spacing). You should also include a technical appendix with a maximum length of 8 pages. Details of what should be included in the executive summary and technical appendix are detailed below. The executive summary, technical appendix, and SIMUL8 model(s) should be uploaded to Moodle before the deadline. Late work will not be accepted.

2.1 Executive summary (60%)

Discuss in detail 1) current operational efficiency of KDC and 2) any changes you would recommend. In particular, highlight any important findings you have discovered about the KDC’s current operations that you wish to bring to Dr West’s attention. Then describe the various alternative system configurations you have tried and explain why you recommendation is best. Be sure to address all of the main targets. If you believe any of the targets is unrealistic, then you should explain why and recommend a suitable change. Please note, this part of the report should be written for a business audience.

Writing to your audience: Whenever you write anything, you must bear in mind your audience. It is always your responsibility to write in a style that your audience will understand. You must, therefore, think about their experience, their familiarity with technical vocabulary, the time they have available to read what you have written, etc. This is actually a difficult skill to acquire. In this project your business and technical reports are written for very different audiences. You must, therefore, make their styles different!

A good report should contain a number of tables and or figures summarizing your results, along with a thorough analysis and discussion of key findings. Be sure to include confidence intervals on any reported results. DO NOT simply copy and paste raw outputs from SIMUL8 into your report. Instead, you should provide nicely formatted figures and tables of results. Also, instead of simply giving a single “answer” or recommendation, consider developing multiple scenarios (e.g. different combinations of resources, different timings on work centres, etc.) and show how the results vary for each scenario.

2.2 Technical appendix and SIMUL8 model(s) (40%)

Briefly describe the setup and flow of your model. Be sure to include a figure showing your model. You can use the print screen button on your keyboard to copy the model from SIMUL8 and then paste it into your document. In addition, annotate the figure and provide a “walk-through” of the model so that it is clear what is happening at each step of the whole process. Highlight any special features of your model.

ive a brief description of which distributions you chose and why. Think about summarising all of this in a table. A good report should also include a brief analysis of how sensitive your results are to the distributions you have chosen, especially for times at the reception area (i.e. try running a sensitivity analysis on the different fitted distributions derived from Stat::Fit or other distribution fitting software).

How did you run your simulations? For example, what did you choose as the total run time for your model? How many trials did you perform for each experiment? Was a warm-up period required? Give a brief justification.

Discuss some of the key assumptions and limitations of your model. What does your model unrealistically impose or fail to consider that occurs in the real-world? How might this be affecting your results?

2.3 Marking criteria

A good project should show that you have achieved the objectives of the module. Projects will be marked accordingly. Thus, there will be marks for developing an appropriate simulation model, analysing the model, and communicating the outcome of that model to a non-specialist audience (i.e. Dr West). Marking criteria for this quantitative case-study assessment are provided below.

Categorical Marking Criteria

Generic/categoric marking criteria will be used to assess the project. The three generic criteria “Communication”, “Understanding, Analysis & Argument” and “Organisation and Presentation” do not have arithmetic weightings. Your overall mark will be based on the marker’s judgement of your overall performance across these three criteria. You will be given feedback which will: (i) show your overall mark; (ii) indicate your performance in each of the three criteria; and (iii) suggestions on how your work could be improved.