Preparing for the Next Health Emergency: Concurrent Management of Pandemic and Non-Pandemic Demand

We investigate how a network of healthcare facilities should manage non-pandemic and pandemic demand to minimize patient wait for care. At the center of our analysis is the question of whether each facility must operate in a specialized (i.e., treating a single patient type) or a generalized (i.e., treating both patient types) mode. To address this question, we develop an optimization model that captures the impact of mix-variability on patient waiting time. We provide an analytical characterization of the optimal demand allocation when facility capacities are equal, and a highly effective heuristic when they are not. These results suggest that the optimal configuration comprises a single generalized facility for a wide range of pandemic and non-pandemic demand rates, and no generalized facility for a limited range of demand rates. We demonstrate the importance of an effective demand allocation for a two-facility network facing an imminent pandemic by proposing a supply-demand management framework that includes capacity expansion as well as demand allocation. Applying this framework to realistic pandemic settings, we demonstrate that the optimal demand allocation reduces the required expansion in capacity by at least 10% compared to the allocation which assigns pandemic and non-pandemic demand to different facilities