Formulating Blood Rotation Policies with Multiple Objectives

Human blood is perishable. Therefore it must be systematically redistributed to hospital blood banks where it will have a high probability of transfusion. Ideally this redistribution, referred to as blood rotation, should be performed in such a manner as to minimze the outdating and improve the quality of blood while keeping the frequency of blood shortages and regional operating costs at reasonable levels. Priorities for attaining these multiple objectives are different in every blood region. Consequently, in this paper, a goal programming model is developed to attain multiple goals as identified by the administrator of a regional blood center. Included in the model are goal constraints related to inventory levels, the availability of fresh blood, blood outdating, the age of the blood, and the cost of collecting it. The paper reports the results of applying the methodology in a large urban-rural blood region in the midwest. Use of the model demonstrated that: -- the percentage of blood collected for use within the region but not used could be reduced from 14.9% to 9.2% without increasing the frequncy of shortages; -- overstocking of hospital blood banks would be eliminated; -- sufficient fresh blood could be made available to meet the needs of special surgery; -- the amount of blood needed to be collected for use within the region could be reduced by over 5%, saving approximately $115,000 per year.