In this context, quality, safety, and efficiency of services for patients are keywords. Patient-centric logistics relate to patient flows through the healthcare system. While healthcare logistics has been defined in various ways by researchers, in this paper, we define it as “operational handlings for the delivery of care, including its supportive services, from origination to recipient.” Focusing on the recipient of services, healthcare logistics could be patient-centric or material-centric. This trend is driven by various societal impacts population growth and an aging society have already put pressure on the operation of healthcare systems. Logistics is one of many growing fields in healthcare management. To support this development, it is important to know what types of logistical problems can be addressed by what types of simulations. To create meaningful simulations for training the non-technical skills used in coordination, there is a need to develop simulations of logistical challenges in a systematic manner as well as to describe and develop learning outcomes for the non-technical skills used in coordination. Simulation in healthcare is well known as a method for training individuals and teams in escalating situations surrounding individual patients. Most of the individuals performing coordination tasks are trained on the job in an unsystematic manner, and the knowledge remains, for the most part, tacit. Little is known about how these prioritizing and coordination skills are learned, how people performing them build their mental system models, what information and strategies they use, and which work practices are most successful. Their decisions often depend on judgements combining perspectives on the relevant medical conditions, the resources at hand, and the urgency of the situation their decisions also depend on receiving information to help make sense of the situation as well as managing high stakes and competing goals.
Many of the everyday decisions regarding how resources will be used for patient care are made by individuals and networks of people performing coordinating functions, in the sense that they manage the timing and execution of many care processes of multiple patients. The cost of failure is high, both in terms of personal tragedies as well as the socio-economic burden of increased costs due to prolonged treatments or hospital stay. Furthermore, in many healthcare settings, resource utilization must be prioritized such that the person most in need of a resource from a medical perspective will receive it. Quality and safety in healthcare depend on the successful interaction between multiple teams, individuals, and support processes aimed at making the right resources, such as medications, medical equipment, information, and people, available at the right time.