Question 4 is solved, but needed to answer question 5.

Question 4:

AUGeneral provides simple elective hernia surgeries to residents of Washington, D.C. Lately, the hospital started to hear complaints that the wait times are long and has asked you to investigate this issue.

After arriving, patients receive a form from the receptionist and fill in their health history and insurance information. This task does not affect the capacity of the process. The form is then handed back to the receptionist who enters this information into the electronic health record system on the computer. Then, a nurse takes the patient to an room to prepare (i.e., take the vitals, give medication) them for the surgery. Then, the patient is brought to the operating room (op. room) in which an anesthesiologist performs general anesthesia to put the patient to an unconscious state. Currently, the anesthesiologist accompanies the patient till the surgery ends. After the patient is ready, the surgery starts. After jp> bg surgery, the patient is taken to a recovery room and the patient is attended by a nurse. The patient checks out once they are well enough to leave the facility.

The following table shows the average time required to complete each task and the corresponding resources associated with each task:

Resources	Task	Average Time (minutes)
Receptionist	Check-in	3
Nurse, Room	Preparation	12
Anesthesiologist, Op. Room	Anesthesia	15
Anesthesiologist, Surgeon, Nurse, Op. Room	Surgery	45
Nurse, Recovery Room	Recovery	25
Receptionist	Check-out	5

There are 1 receptionist, 4 nurses, 2 rooms, 2 anesthesiologists, 2 surgeons, 2 op. rooms and 2 recovery rooms in the hospital.

(3 points) What is the flow time of a customer in this process (in minutes)?

Flow time = 3 + 12 + 15 +45 +25+5 = 105 minutes

(3 points) Complete the table below. Determine the total workload assigned to each resource per patient. Show all your work and fill in the answers in the table. Notice that you will compute the capacity of each resource.

Resource	Average Time per Patient (minutes)	Hourly Capacity (patients/hour/resource) of Each Resource
Receptionist	3 + 5 = 8 minutes	(60mins/8mins) *1= 7.5 patients/hour/receptionist
Nurse	12 +25 + 45 = 82 minutes	(60mins/82mins) *4= 2.93 patients/hour/nurse
Room	12 minutes	(60mins/12mins) *2= 10 patients/hour/ room
Anesthesiologist	15 +45 = 60 minutes	(60mins/60mins) *2= 2 patients/hour/anesthesiologist
Op. Room	15 + 45 = 60 minutes	(60mins/60mins) *2= 2 patients/hour/op.room
Surgeon	45 minutes	(60mins/45mins) *2= 2.66 patients/hour/surgeon
Recovery room	25 minutes	(60mins/25mins) *2= 4.8 patients/hour/recovery room

(2 points) What is the hourly capacity (i.e., maximum hourly throughput rate) of the process? Remember to consider the number of resources available. Your answer should be in number of patients per hour.

The hourly capacity of the process is 2 patients/hour/resource. The resource with the lowest capacity (bottleneck) is equal to 2.

(2 points) Which resource (or resources) is (are) the bottleneck of this process?

The bottlenecks in this process are anesthesiologist and op. room.

(4 points) What is the hourly utilization rate of each resource if the bottleneck(s) work nonstop during a 10-hour day? Keep in mind that the non-bottleneck resources may be idle during the day because the process follows the pace of the bottleneck resource and that a patient is served completely on the day they arrive, i.e., there is no work-in-process remaining at the end of the day. Complete the table below.

Resource	Utilization rate
Receptionist	2/(1*7.5) = .266 or 26%
Nurse	2/(4*2.93) = .1706 or 17.06%
Room	2/(2*10)=.10 or 10%
Anesthesiologist	2/(2*2)= 0.5 or 50%
Op. Room	2/ (2*2)= 0.5 or 50%
Surgeon	2/(2*2.66)= 0.3759 or 37.59%
Recovery room	2/ (2*4.8)=.2083 or 20.83%

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Question-5. (21 points)

Consider the process introduced in Question-4. You are provided with additional information:

The hospital expects the demand to increase. A patient brings $4000 in revenue, on average. The hospital is investigating potential process improvements and considers the following options to increase the daily process capacity. The hospital wants to determine which option will have higher benefit (measured by total revenue minus the total variable costs).

Option-A: Let the anesthesiologist use the room to administer anesthesia so the 15 minutes of the operating room is now freed, and the anesthesiologist stays only for 30 minutes during the surgery instead of the current practice of 45 minutes.

Option-B: Hospital decides to add another operating room which costs $1000/hr and the anesthesiologist stays only for 30 minutes of each surgery instead of the current 45 minutes on the average. You can ignore the fixed cost of constructing a new operating room.

(15 points) Complete the table below to provide decision support to Eagle Dental Clinic management.

Options	Resulting process capacity (patients per hour)	Resulting bottleneck resource(s)	Total benefit ($ per day) in a 10-hour day (Total revenue per day Total variable cost per day)
No change
A
B

(6 points) Which option is the best? Explain clearly, and make sure your recommendation and justification are supported by calculations. (For simplicity, you can assume that peak demand hours constitute the vast majority of their business and can ignore any potential impact on the slower hours.)