{"status":"ok","message-type":"work","message-version":"1.0.0","message":{"indexed":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,2]],"date-time":"2025-08-02T16:25:04Z","timestamp":1754151904941,"version":"3.41.2"},"reference-count":49,"publisher":"Oxford University Press (OUP)","issue":"8","license":[{"start":{"date-parts":[[2025,5,9]],"date-time":"2025-05-09T00:00:00Z","timestamp":1746748800000},"content-version":"vor","delay-in-days":0,"URL":"https:\/\/academic.oup.com\/pages\/standard-publication-reuse-rights"}],"content-domain":{"domain":[],"crossmark-restriction":false},"short-container-title":[],"published-print":{"date-parts":[[2025,8,1]]},"abstract":"<jats:title>Abstract<\/jats:title>\n               <jats:sec>\n                  <jats:title>Background<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>Intrahospital patient transport is pivotal in enabling hospital operations and facilitating safe and efficient patient movement. However, transport delays are common in hospitals, signaling a need for improvement. This study develops, implements, and evaluates a proximity-based transporter-to-request assignment system aimed at improving transport service system efficiency.<\/jats:p>\n               <\/jats:sec>\n               <jats:sec>\n                  <jats:title>Materials and Methods<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>In this observational study, we used discrete-event simulation to design and optimize an enhancement to an electronic medical record\u2019s original first-in, first-out transporter-to-request assignment system, and we implemented it at a quaternary care academic medical center. Our enhancement prioritizes requests based on the proximity of available transporters within pre-specified areas. We compared transport request completion time (primary outcome) and the percentage of transports exceeding 45 minutes (secondary outcome) during control (01\/2021-02\/2022) and intervention (02\/2022-03\/2023) periods and estimated their differences using multivariate generalized linear models to adjust for confounding factors including variable workforce levels and workload.<\/jats:p>\n               <\/jats:sec>\n               <jats:sec>\n                  <jats:title>Results<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>A total of 136\u00a0414 transport requests were included in the study. The intervention was associated with an adjusted 5.0% (95% confidence interval 1.8%-8.5%) reduction in completion times and a 16.0% (7.4%-23.9%) relative reduction in the percentage of trips exceeding the 45-minute completion time target.<\/jats:p>\n               <\/jats:sec>\n               <jats:sec>\n                  <jats:title>Discussion<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>The intervention\u2019s improvements stem from reductions in unnecessary travel time between transport requests, common to first-in first-out assignment systems. The intervention was designed to be natively integrated into existing electronic health record systems, reducing barriers to real-world adoption.<\/jats:p>\n               <\/jats:sec>\n               <jats:sec>\n                  <jats:title>Conclusion<\/jats:title>\n                  <jats:p>Implementing a proximity-based assignment system designed based on simulation-optimization modeling improved intrahospital patient transport efficiency without requiring additional staff.<\/jats:p>\n               <\/jats:sec>","DOI":"10.1093\/jamia\/ocaf081","type":"journal-article","created":{"date-parts":[[2025,5,9]],"date-time":"2025-05-09T11:04:44Z","timestamp":1746788684000},"page":"1255-1266","source":"Crossref","is-referenced-by-count":1,"title":["Improved intrahospital transport time via proximity-based staff assignments"],"prefix":"10.1093","volume":"32","author":[{"ORCID":"https:\/\/orcid.org\/0000-0002-1906-6080","authenticated-orcid":false,"given":"Christopher L 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