Keynote Abstract:

Xtreme modelling of healthcare systems

Mike Pidd

Professor, Associate Dean, Management School
University of Lancaster, UK

By their nature extreme sports are very risky, which is precisely why some people love to take part in them. The idea of extremes was adopted, some years ago, in parts of the software engineering community under the title of Xtreme Programming. As we know, the XP initials then found their way on to most of our desktops, though that’s another story. Xtreme Programming stresses the need for flexibility and continual interaction with users and customers. Perhaps similar lessons apply in simulation modelling? For example, one of the biggest mistakes often made in any simulation modelling comes from a faulty chain of logic that specifies: aim for great detail, because this leads to greater fidelity, which leads to better models, which leads to a better result. Instead, simpler and xtreme models may be better. In this talk, I shall discuss some extreme and xtreme ideas, relating them to well-known principles of modelling and, in turn relating these to simulation modelling in the improvement of healthcare.

Speaker’s biography:

Mike Pidd is Professor of Management Science in the Lancaster University Management School. He has been active in simulation work for over 30 years and combines this with an interest in the ways that people develop and use models in Operational Research. He is author of 2 books (Computer Simulation in Management Science and Tools for Thinking: Modelling in Management Science) and editor of two others (Computer Modelling for Discrete Simulation and Systems Modelling: Theory and Practice) all published by John Wiley. His research work has been published in major OR and simulation journals and conferences. In recent years, his work has focussed on the public sector and he is currently engaged in developing models of general hospitals to understand the effect of performance measurement and target regimes. During 2004/5 he was a Research Fellow in the UK’s Advanced Institute of Management Research, in which role he examined the link between systems, models and performance measurement in the delivery of public services. He is Chair of the Business & Management Studies panel for the 2008 RAE, which makes him very popular – but he knows this will not last.