WO2019139478A1

WO2019139478A1 - A method of, and system for notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures in an operating room

Info

Publication number: WO2019139478A1
Application number: PCT/NL2019/050015
Authority: WO
Inventors: Alberto Andres OCAMPO RIOS; Olga LISKA-LUZI; Victor Paulus Marcellus Vloemans
Original assignee: Topic Ip3 B.V.
Priority date: 2018-01-10
Filing date: 2019-01-10
Publication date: 2019-07-18

Abstract

The present invention relates to a method comprising the steps of: obtain an initial schedule of the at least one operating room, the initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of the medical procedures, validating the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule based on historical schedule data, obtaining, during running the medical procedure of the validated schedule, real-time medical procedure tracking data from the operating room in which the medical procedure is being performed, validating the running schedule by forecasting a time duration of the running medical procedure by forecasting a time duration the running medical procedure based on the real-time medical procedure tracking data and historical medical procedure tracking data; and determining if the forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value, and obtaining a notification listing comprising a plurality of medical staff profiles and corresponding preparation time value, determining, for each of the medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures of the running schedule affected by the running medical procedure to exceed the threshold value, a preparation time value of a corresponding of medical staff profile, notifying the medical staff prior to a medical procedure of the running schedule in correspondence with the determined preparation time value.

Description

Title: A method of, and system for notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures in an operating room.

DESCRIPTION

The present invention relates to an improved system of, and a method for notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures in an operating room, and more particularly to an improved system of, and a method for notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures which are scheduled for an operating room which is especially suited for hospitals and clinics.

The present invention also relates to an improved system of, and a method for operating room scheduling, and more particularly to an improved system of, and a method for operating room scheduling especially suited for hospitals and clinics.

As the total expenses in health care continuously increase over time, hospitals and clinics are seeking for ways to reduce expenses and be more efficient. In these times of saving costs and increasing efficiency management have to tackle a number of challenges to bring the rapid increase of total health care costs to a halt.

Some departments within the hospitals and the clinics cost more than others. One of the departments with the highest costs are the operating rooms, or OR for short, including all equipment and staff that are assigned thereto. In the present application, the term OR is intended to include several specialized areas in the hospital and clinics such as PACU and ICU where significant resources are also consumed.

Every hospital and clinic simply has a limited amount of operating rooms. Due to the high costs of the operating rooms, it is desirable to make optimal use of all resources of the operating room. Scheduling of the surgical operations is thus critical. However, since not all surgical operations of the same type have the same time duration, efficient scheduling is a big challenge. And since the course of a surgical operation is hard to predict, and often small or large complications occur, all surgical operations performed in one single operating rooms have to be scheduled in such a way that a complication does not influence too many other surgical operations being scheduled. A delay of an operation performed in one operating room may influence an operation in another operating room, e.g. due to equipment and/or personnel moving from one operating room to the other.

Optimal scheduling is however a very complex process since a lot of factors influence its course. There are systems known which provide computerized scheduling of surgical cases. These systems offer different features which aid surgery schedulers in their job of scheduling but are not able to find a schedule which is optimal in a mathematically provable sense.

Once the schedule is generated the schedule may be executed, but then the process and hence progress of this procedure becomes opaque. Medical staff, also referred to as stakeholders, that is involved in executing the medical procedures being scheduled may not be able to take notice of the progress of the schedule. Known OR scheduling systems may only be able to provide sporadic and subjective updates on the status of a current medical procedure. As such, it is often only at the end of the running procedure that the surgery scheduler is informed of the progress, and therefore only at the end of the procedure it can be determined if there is a delay in the schedule or even if the current procedure is finished earlier.

Currently, stakeholders such as surgeons, nurses, anaesthesiologists, cleaning staff, etc. must assume that future procedures will start upon their scheduled time. This leads to the drawback of the known systems wherein stakeholders are idling when the current procedure runs late and a loss of time of the OR when the current procedure is finished earlier and the next procedure could have started earlier. Current scheduling systems are thus only able to inform the surgery scheduler too late, and as such, stakeholders will often idle around waiting for a procedure to start, or could have been more efficient when the schedule allows a next procedure to start earlier.

Due the logistics being involved, e.g. moving from one location within the hospital to another, moving from house to hospital, transporting a patient from the ward to the OR, etc., the impact of inefficient use of OR and stakeholders is large.

Summary

It is an object of the present invention to provide a method for notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures with increased efficiency in respect of use of resources, e.g. equipment and staff. It is another object of the present invention to provide a system for generating such a notification system.

It is yet another object of the present invention to provide a method for generating an operating room schedule with increased efficiency in respect of use of resources, e.g. equipment and staff.

It is another object of the present invention to provide a system for generating such a schedule.

The aforementioned object is accomplished, in a first aspect, by providing a computer controlled method of notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures in at least one operating room, the method being performed by a notification engine and comprising the steps of:

obtain an initial schedule of the at least one operating room, the initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of the medical procedures;

validating the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule based on historical schedule data;

obtaining, during running the medical procedure of the validated schedule, real-time medical procedure tracking data from the operating room in which the medical procedure is being performed;

validating the running schedule by forecasting a time duration of the running medical procedure by forecasting a time duration the running medical procedure based on the real-time medical procedure tracking data and historical medical procedure tracking data; and determining if the forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value, and wherein the method further comprises the steps of:

obtaining a notification listing comprising a plurality of medical staff profiles and corresponding preparation time value;

determining, for each of the medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures of the running schedule affected by the running medical procedure to exceed the threshold value, a preparation time value of a corresponding of medical staff profile; notifying the medical staff prior to a medical procedure of the running schedule in correspondence with the determined preparation time value.

With the continuous increase of total expenses in health care, hospitals and clinics are seeking for ways to reduce expenses and be more efficient. In order to accomplish this, they need to address the expenses in those areas where the spending is the greatest. One area with high expenses is the operating room or OR for short. Since OR resources, e.g. medical staff and equipment are limited, the scheduling of the medical procedures performed in a OR (and PACU, ICU or the like) should be performed with high efficiency. This is however very complex due to vast amount of OR resources involved in the process and the difficulty in predicting a correct time duration of the medical procedures being performed in the OR. Often a complication arises during performing a medical procedure. In such cases not only that procedure may run late, but it may conflict with one or more subsequently scheduled procedure in that OR. To cope with such complexity and anticipate complications currently known scheduling systems introduce buffer time frames in between the individual medical procedures. This way the risk of an anomaly influencing the schedule as a whole is minimized, however at the cost of inefficient use of the OR and the allocation of medical equipment and medical staff or personnel.

It was one of the insights of the inventors that a scheduling of an OR can be more efficient upon more efficient notification of all medical personnel or staff involved in performing the medical procedures. The medical staff or stakeholders will be informed just in time to be able to make efficient use of both their own time as well as the time the OR is available. To realise this, it is proposed to define a list of all types of medical staff and generate a profile for each of the different types of staff members. Each profile may comprise a corresponding preparation time value which reflects the amount of time that this particular stakeholder needs prior to performing their tasks at the OR. A certain surgeon profile for example may indicate that the surgeon does not need to be present at the OR for certain procedures upon the start of the procedure due to task that have to be performed prior to the tasks of the surgeon. For example, those performed by a nurse or an anaesthetist. Once preparation time values for all stakeholders involved in the medical procedures are determined, it will be able to notify the stakeholders individually on a per-role basis at the exact moment in time such that idling of medical staff and inefficient use of the OR is minimized or prevented. In a first aspect of the invention it is proposed to obtain an initial schedule for at least one operating room. The schedule holds several types of data elements, amongst which a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of said medical procedures. The schedule may however also contain additional data elements such as time and date data, patient data, static OR data such as equipment permanently available in the OR, etc.

Once the initial schedule is obtained, which schedule may be the outcome of a conventional booking or scheduling system, and/or a schedule entered manually by one of the schedule planning personnel, historical scheduling data is obtained as well. The historical scheduling data may be stored in a database or may be present in the form of a mathematical predictive algorithm which represents a validation engine in which all historical data is modelled.

The historical data may consist of a plurality data elements that comprise medical procedures, allocation of equipment, allocation of medical staff, patient data, and interrelations between said data elements. Hence, preferably all relevant data that relate directly or indirectly to the medical procedures in the schedule are contained in the historical data.

The initial schedule is then validated against the historical data by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule. The forecasting has to be interpreted as comparing the medical procedures of the initial schedule with medical procedures of the historical schedule having a predetermined amount of corresponding data elements and interrelations. The forecast may also be the outcome of running the initial schedule through a validation engine which represents a modelling of all historical data, e.g. making use of machine learning in which the historical data is modelled as an algorithm that may predict likelihood of the medical procedures in the schedule to end at the scheduled time.

In accordance with all aspects of the invention, the historical data may comprise data from one, or multiple or preferably all operating rooms of a particular hospital or clinic, but preferably, comprises a large data set with data from operating rooms of several hospitals or clinics. In that case, the data is preferably anonymized to such a degree that the patient cannot be identified by the recipient of the information. The anonymization may be based on known anonymization techniques such as encryption of personally identifiable information, K-anonymity, generalization, perturbation, etc.

When the initial schedule may not be validated as a schedule that is feasible and resilient, meaning that the chance of medical procedures to experience delay is minimized or their delay is at least coped with in the schedule, this may be notified to a person responsible for the scheduling. He or she may then either manually alter the schedule and introduce it into the system for re-validation, or the system may indicate suggestions how to alter the schedule. In an example, the system may even automatically alter the current schedule in a way that the schedule may be validated correctly. This may be performed as an iterative process or a leaner routine in which small adaptions are introduced and the outcome is compared against the revised model, and wherein the revised model may be reshaped over and over.

Once the schedule is validated and executed, real-time medical procedure tracking data may be generated from within the operating room in which the medical procedure of the schedule is being performed. The data is received from the operating room and processed for validating the current, running schedule. Upon the validation the real-time date obtained from the operating room is compared with historical medical procedure tracking date that is already present, on the basis of this comparison it is determined if the forecasted time duration meets the scheduled time duration of the medical procedure or that it may exceed a certain predetermined threshold value. If the threshold value is exceeded, then medical staff is notified.

In accordance with the invention the notification of the medical procedure to run late, is performed in a role-based manner. The stakeholders that are part of scheduled future medical procedures that are affected by a change in the schedule are informed on a per-role base which means that surgeons will have a different role than nurses for example. Each role is defined by a medical staff profile which not only contains the type of medical staff and the preparation time needed prior to the start of a medical procedure but may also contain other relevant variables such as the tasks that have to be performed for that particular medical procedure. Hence, a nurse may have several tasks and may thus be assigned to several profiles, each profile having one or a group of tasks since not every task may be required at the same moment in time. This way the level in which medical staff is idling due to opaqueness of the process of the running medical procedure is minimized as well as the time that the OR is not being fully occupied.

In an example, the method further comprises:

obtaining, a personal communication profile listing comprising for each medical staff member of said medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures a notification profile, said notification profile comprising a medical staff member identification, at least a first and a second communication means attribute, said first and second communication attributes comprising different communication protocols, and a communication attribute preference; and wherein said step of notifying further comprises notifying said medical staff member prior to a medical procedure of said running schedule in correspondence with said determined preparation time value through said communication protocol of said first or second communication attribute in accordance with said communication attribute preference.

Each of the medical staff members is assigned a certain role, such as a surgeon, anaesthesiologist, nurse, etc. In accordance with that particular role, the staff member is informed corresponding to a preparation time that is defined to that particular role assigned to that staff member. Each staff member however may also have multiple communication means attributes. Each of these communication means attributes has a different communication protocol such as a text message which may be sent as a text message service component of a telecommunication system, i.e. a Short Message Service, SMS, or through a web interface, manual or automated voice call or voice message such as an interactive voice response system which may interact with the caller, i.e. the staff member, through use of voice, DTMF tones or via a keypad interface.

All staff members may be identified in a personal communication profile listing. The listing comprises at least one, but preferably two or even more different communication means attributes. Once the staff member is to be notified the communication profile listing may provide information on the preference through which communication means that particular staff member should be contacted. This could be, as indicated, a text message, voice message, email, etc.

In an example, the medical staff member is notified prior to a medical procedure through said communication protocol of said first communication attribute and subsequently through said communication protocol of said second communication attribute upon expiration of a non-response timer.

The notification may be automated to such a level, that a further, lower priority communication means may be selected to contact the staff member if no response is received within a predetermined time period on the higher priority communication means, defined and implemented as a non-response timer that expires.

In an example, the notifying of said medical staff member comprises sending a notification message to said medical staff member which comprises context awareness data and receiving a feedback based on said context awareness data.

Preferably, the notification is not only automated to such a level, that the notification data is automatically generated in correspondence with the preparation time value but the feedback is also automated by making use of an interactive response system such as an interactive voice response system through a voice call, or through notification message that is context aware and wherein the response is partly or fully automate based in the content of the message or the context or environment wherein the communication device of staff member is present. If, for example, it is determined that the communication device of the staff member is not allocated to a telecommunication terminal, e.g. a wireless network router, of the hospital, then the system may conclude that the staff member is not nearby, and that other communication means attributes such have higher priority, or that the preparation time value should be adjusted. The system may also learn, e.g. through an artificial intelligence learning algorithm, from historical data of the use of the first, second communication attributes. If, for example, the first communication attributes like a text message towards a mobile phone is used as a communication means towards certain medical staff members or members of a role, which often not respond within the predetermined time period, then the priority for that member(s) or role can be changed accordingly.

In an example, the real-time medical procedure tracking data is obtained from one or more sensors in the operating room.

In an example, the sensors comprise one or more of the group consisting of an optical object recognition system, optical object tracking system, inertial sensor system, a mechanical sensor system, a radio frequency sensor system, a magnetic sensor system.

In an example, the steps of validating comprise the use of machine learning.

In an example, the steps of validating comprise the use of machine learning and wherein both the validated initial schedule as well as the obtained real time medical procedure tracking data are used to improve the machine learning algorithm for validating future schedules.

In an example, the method further comprises the step of:

notifying a schedule planner upon during the validation of the initial schedule the forecasted time duration exceeds the threshold value.

In an example, the method further comprises the step of:

updating the initial schedule and performing the step of validating the updated initial schedule until the updated initial schedule is validated.

In an example, the medical staff comprise operating room personnel at least comprising one of a surgeon, anaesthesiologist, nurse, operating department practitioner and cleaning staff, and the equipment comprise at least one of a plurality of medical equipment such as a heart/lung machine, anaesthesia machines, surgical instruments, blood-pressure monitor.

In a second aspect, a scheduling system is provided comprising at least one computer system running a workflow engine arranged for generating at least one operating room schedule comprising allocation of equipment and medical staff, the scheduling system comprising:

a historical schedule database comprising historical schedule data, consisting of a plurality data element comprising medical procedures, allocation of equipment, allocation of medical staff, patient data, and interrelations between the data elements;

input means for obtaining an initial schedule for the at least one operating room, the initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of the medical procedures, and wherein the input means are further arranged to obtain the historical schedule data from the historical schedule database; a validation engine, arranged for validating the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule, wherein the forecasting comprises comparing the medical procedures of the initial schedule with medical procedures of the historical schedule having a predetermined amount of corresponding data elements and interrelations, wherein the historical schedule data further comprises historical medical procedure tracking data elements obtained from an operating room; and wherein the input means are further arranged for obtaining, during running the medical procedure of the validated schedule, real-time medical procedure tracking data from the operating room in which the medical procedure is being performed; and wherein the validation engine is further arranged for validating the running schedule by forecasting a time duration of the running medical procedure by comparing the real-time medical procedure tracking data with the historical medical procedure tracking data, and determining if the forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value; and wherein the system further comprises

a notification engine arranged for notifying medical staff allocated to a medical procedure of the running schedule if forecasted time duration exceeds the threshold value.

In a third aspect, a computer program is provided comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous descriptions.

In a fourth aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous claims descriptions.

In a fourth aspect, a data carrier signal is provided carrying the computer program of the previous description.

Another object of the invention is accomplished, in a fifth aspect, by providing a computer controlled method of scheduling operating rooms, generating at least one operating room schedule comprising allocation of equipment and medical staff, the method being performed by a workflow engine and comprising the steps of:

obtaining an initial schedule for the at least one operating room, the initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of the medical procedures; obtaining historical schedule data, consisting of a plurality data element comprising medical procedures, allocation of equipment, allocation of medical staff, patient data, and interrelations between the data elements;

validating the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule, wherein the forecasting comprises comparing the medical procedures of the initial schedule with medical procedures of the historical schedule having a predetermined amount of corresponding data elements and interrelations, wherein the historical schedule data further comprises historical medical procedure tracking data elements obtained from an operating room, and the method further comprises the steps of:

validating the running schedule by forecasting a time duration of the running medical procedure by comparing the real-time medical procedure tracking data with the historical medical procedure tracking data, and determining if the forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value;

notifying medical staff allocated to a medical procedure of the running schedule if forecasted time duration exceeds the threshold value.

With the continuous increase of total expenses in health care, hospitals and clinics are seeking for ways to reduce expenses and be more efficient. In order to accomplish this, they need to address the expenses in those areas where the spending is the greatest. One area with high expenses is the operating room or OR for short. Since OR resources, e.g. medical staff and equipment are limited, the scheduling of the medical procedures performed in a OR (and PACU, ICU or the like) should be performed with high efficiency. This is however very complex due to vast amount of OR resources involved in the process and the difficulty in predicting a correct time duration of the medical procedures being performed in the OR. Often a complication arises during performing a medical procedure. In such cases not only that procedure may run late, but it may conflict with one ore more subsequently scheduled procedure in that OR. To cope with such complexity and anticipate complications currently known scheduling systems introduce buffer time frames in between the individual medical procedures. This way the risk of an anomaly influencing the schedule as a whole is minimized, however at the cost of inefficient use of the OR and the allocation of medical equipment and medical personnel.

It was one of the insights of the inventors that a scheduling of an OR can be more efficient upon an improved estimation of the likelihood of one or more medical procedures to exceed the scheduled time duration, e.g. the duration to be late or early to such a degree that a threshold is exceeded. Such estimation is currently done by knowledge from experienced planning personnel. They may indicate that the likelihood of certain scheduled medical procedures to experience complications is high, they may extend the time duration of that particular medical procedure or introduce specific buffer time frames in the schedule to cope with this. This is however very arbitrary and requires experienced personnel. One of the insights of the inventors was that the schedule may be validated by not only use of historical data of a plurality of medical procedures which improves the estimation of the likelihood of the medical procedure to exceed the scheduled time duration, but also to use real-time input from the operating room itself. Exceeding of the threshold is in view of this invention to be interpreted as both exceeding by a delay, or by the medical procedure duration to be lower than the forecasted duration to such a degree that it exceeds the threshold.

By use of a validation engine an initial schedule, which is generated by for example a computer through a simple scheduling engine and/or entered manually by scheduling personnel, may be validated to predict if the schedule is feasible and resilient by making use of computational statistics and mathematical optimization routines that are based on both historical data and real-time sensor data. The outcome of the validation is used to notify relevant actors in the schedule, if the validation engine indicates the schedule not to be sufficiently feasible and resilient. This way not only more optimal or optimized schedules are generated, by which the need of introducing buffer time frames or calculate extra time of particular medical procedures is minimized, it also provides a system in which medical personnel is notified of changes in the schedule at the most optimal moment in time.

Currently, the medical personnel allocated for scheduled medical procedures (also known as medical stakeholders), will have to assume that the scheduled medical procedures are being performed at their scheduled time. This leads to the stakeholders idling when the current procedure runs late. Or it may also lead to loss of time if the current procedure is finished earlier and the subsequent procedure could have started earlier. With the proposed validation and subsequent notification based on both historical data and real-time live data from the operating room, not only the anomalies of the schedule are reduced, idling of stakeholders is minimized as well since they are informed directly and not only at the end of the current procedure as it is currently done.

As indicated, it is proposed to obtain an initial schedule for at least one operating room. The schedule hold several types of data elements, amongst which a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of said medical procedures. The schedule may however also contain additional data elements such as time and date data, patient data, static OR data such as equipment permanently available in the OR, etc.

The historical data may consisting of a plurality data elements that comprise medical procedures, allocation of equipment, allocation of medical staff, patient data, and interrelations between said data elements. Hence, preferably all relevant data that relate directly or indirectly to the medical procedures in the schedule are contained in the historical data.

Once the schedule is validated and executed, real-time medical procedure tracking data may be generated from within the operating room in which the medical procedure of the schedule is being performed. The data is received from the operating room and processed for validating the current, running schedule. Upon the validation the real-time date obtained from the operating room is compared with historical medical procedure tracking date that is already present, on the basis of this comparison it is determined if the forecasted time duration meets the scheduled time duration of the medical procedure or that it may exceed a certain predetermined threshold value. If the threshold value is exceeded, then a notification is sent to the medical staff which is allocated to any of the medical procedures of the schedule that are affected by the expected delay of the current running medical procedure. This way not only an efficient, effective and resilient schedule is generated. The schedule is mathematically optimized by taking into account all elements that have or may have influence on the course of one or more of the medical procedures. Moreover, the level in which medical staff is idling due to opaqueness of the process of the running medical procedure is minimized as well.

In an example, the sensors comprise one or more of the group consisting of an optical object recognition system, optical object tracking system, inertial sensor system, a mechanical sensor system, a radio frequency sensor system, a magnetic sensor system. Alternatively, the sensors may also comprise an array of solar cells and/or an array of photodiodes which can be used for determining when, and which, surgical instruments are removed from the tray for placing the surgical instruments on top thereof during surgery. The solar cells or photodiodes are arranged to receive light present in the operating room and thereby induce a light detection current by which the equipment used during surgery can be detected based on a detected current characteristic in the induced light detection current. The detected current characteristic can be compared to an identification database with a plurality of current characteristics which represent plural instruments.

In an example, the steps of validating comprise the use of machine learning.

In an example, the method further comprises the step of:

In a sixth aspect a scheduling system is provided comprising at least one computer system running a workflow engine arranged for generating at least one operating room schedule comprising allocation of equipment and medical staff, the scheduling system comprising:

communication means for obtaining an initial schedule for the at least one operating room, the initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of the medical procedures, and wherein the communication means are further arranged to obtain the historical schedule data from the historical schedule database;

a validation engine, arranged for validating the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of the initial schedule, wherein the forecasting comprises comparing the medical procedures of the initial schedule with medical procedures of the historical schedule having a predetermined amount of corresponding data elements and interrelations, wherein the historical schedule data further comprises historical medical procedure tracking data elements obtained from an operating room; and wherein the communication means are further arranged for obtaining, during running the medical procedure of the validated schedule, real-time medical procedure tracking data from the operating room in which the medical procedure is being performed; and wherein the validation engine is further arranged for validating the running schedule by forecasting a time duration of the running medical procedure by comparing the real-time medical procedure tracking data with the historical medical procedure tracking data, and determining if the forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value; and wherein the system further comprises

In a seventh aspect, a computer program is provided comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous descriptions.

In a eight aspect, a computer-readable storage medium is provided comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous claims descriptions.

In a ninth aspect, a data carrier signal is provided carrying the computer program of the previous description.

The examples described below may apply to one, some or all of the aspects of the invention as described above.

In an example, not only the staff members may be notified that are involved in performing all sorts of procedures prior to, during or after the scheduled operations, but preferably, also further actors that are involved or related to the patient, e.g. the family members, or relatives of the patient. Preferably, the patient may provide a list of such further actors which are notified as well once it is determined that the running schedule is affected by a medical procedure that is to exceed the threshold value.

In another example, the initial schedule of the at least one operating room may be updated in accordance with a patient preference, which is obtained from a patient preference listing which at least comprises one or more patient preference values of the group of preferred surgery date, preferred surgery time of day, preferred surgery location.

If patient data is stored, and or used in a patient preference listing, the system preferably anonymizes the data of the patient by removing, or modifying the data to such a degree that the patient cannot be identified by the recipient of the information. Preferably, the data is thus removed or translated irreversibly, encoded, or swapped.

In another example, the initial schedule of the at least one operating room may be updated in accordance with a patient profile, which is obtained from a patient profile listing which at least comprises one or more patient preference values of the group of age, gender, length, medical patient data, etc.

Preferably the schedule may be updated in accordance with a estimated and/or a determined time duration deviation. Thus, each medical procedure may be classified into a procedure with certain average time duration deviation, i.e. certain procedures may time 2 hours with a deviation of plus or minus 10%. Other operations may require 2 hours but with a deviation of plus or minus 1 %. Updating the schedule to combine or to device the procedures with higher or lower deviations may result in better estimation of the chance that the schedule can not be met or performed since one or more procedures may exceed the threshold value. The estimate time duration deviation may also be based on the patient profile, hence taking into account the characteristics of the patient such as age, gender, length and/or medical patient data. In either way, better efficiency of the operating rooms may be achieved.

These and other aspects of the invention will be apparent from and elucidated with reference to the embodiment(s) described hereinafter.

Brief description of the drawings Figure 1 discloses a method of a role-based feedback in accordance with the present disclosure;

Figure 2 discloses an overview of a system in accordance with a first aspect of the present disclosure.

Figure 3 discloses a method of operating room scheduling in accordance with the present disclosure;

Figure 4 discloses an overview of a system in accordance with another aspect of the present disclosure.

Detailed description

The present disclosure is directed to a method, for example implemented by a software program, for notifying medical staff that is involved in performing a medical procedure in one or several operating room(s) of a hospital, clinic or the like.

In an effort of reducing costs for hospitals, clinics and other such institutes, operating rooms (also referred to as OR for short, or operating theatre, operating suite, operation theatre or operation suites) need to be used in a most efficient manner, e.g. with the most efficient usage of time.

Operating rooms are facilities within a hospital or clinic where surgical operations are carried out. These rooms are often sterile environments. An OR is often supplied with a wall suction, oxygen, and possibly other anaesthetic gases. Key equipment consists of the operating table and the anaesthesia cart. In addition, there are tables to set up instruments. There is storage space for common surgical supplies and containers for disposables. Some of the used equipment may consists of sterile instruments used during the surgery, electronic monitoring devices for example for monitoring heartbeat and oxygen levels of the patent, a heart-lung machine (if needed) but also diagnostic systems may be present, e.g. MRI or other imaging systems.

When a patient is to be operated in an operating room, the medical procedure, e.g. the surgery, is planned and entered into a planning system together with all other scheduled surgeries. Based on al surgeries in the planning system an initial surgery schedule, or initial schedule for short, is generated. This schedule may be very clear and communicated to all relevant parties, e.g. the planner, a manager and all personnel such as the surgeon, nurses anaesthetist, etc. Once the surgery has started, the progress of this procedure is however opaque. All relevant parties, being those parties that are involved in some way or the other, e.g. the surgeons, nurses, anaesthetists etc. (also in general referred to as stakeholders), and not being present in the OR performing the current surgery are only very sporadic informed of the process of the surgery. These updates are sporadic, subjective and often received at random. This leads to loss in efficiency for the stakeholders outside the OR in the area of time management since they are waiting to start the surgery that is scheduled after the current surgery. When there is a delay in the current surgery, the stakeholders waist time in waiting for the surgery to end, and for their surgery to start. It is however also possible that the current surgery may end earlier and that the surgery scheduled next could have started earlier, or an additional surgery may be added to the schedule, but due to the fact that the stakeholders aren’t ready yet and had not been informed timely, the next surgery cannot start as hoped. This results in inefficient usage of time of the OR.

The present disclosure is directed to minimizing this effect of loss of time of the OR, or inefficient usage of time of the OR. It is proposed to have better insight in the actual progress of the surgery, to forecast an estimated end-time and to inform all stakeholders on a role-per-role bases. This means that each involved party or stakeholder may have at least a dedicated preparation time needed prior to the surgery. In accordance with that preparation time, all stakeholders for which it has been determined to have such a same role, may be notified of the scheduled end or start time of the surgery, thereby taking the preparation time into account.

In accordance with the present disclosure, such a method 10 is proposed which may be implemented as a computer controlled method of notifying medical staff that is involved in performing medical procedures in at least one operating room. The method can be performed by a notification engine and may comprise plural steps.

In the first step, step 1 1 , an initial schedule of the at least one operating room is obtained. This schedule may be the outcome of a planning system of the hospital. The initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of said medical procedures. The schedule may be obtained from an external or internal hospital information system, or may be generated within the system of the invention itself. It may however also be a schedule that is generated manually by a planner or schedule planning assistant.

Once the initial schedule is obtained, the next step 12 is to validate that initial schedule by performing a forecast of the initial schedule. The forecast is a forecast of the time duration of each medical procedure that is in the schedule. The actual forecasting may be performed based on historical scheduling data this present within or outside of the system and obtained from the same hospital or from several hospitals. That data is preferably randomized by removing personal information such as names or personal details of the patient.

After that, the schedule is ready to be used. Once the schedule is used and one of the medical procedures from the schedule is being executed, the schedule becomes the current or running schedule. Contrary to known hospital schedule systems, the progress of the running schedule is not opaque, amongst others due to the fact that medical procedure tracking data is obtained in real-time in step 13. The use of certain sensors in the OR, for example in the form of solar cells and/or an array of photodiodes that detect presence/absence of medical instruments from an instrument tray, may be a way of determining progress of the medical procedure. Obtained real-time sensor data may be input in an algorithm to determine whether the use of certain instruments corresponds exactly to, or takes place earlier or later in time than predicted.

The sensor data is used in step 14 to validate the current running schedule by making a new time duration forecast. In this new forecast, both the real time medical procedure tracking data may be input into an artificial intelligence routine, together with historical medical procedure tracking data. The outcome is a prediction or estimation of the deviance from the initial forecast such that the system can determine if a threshold value is exceeded. If the threshold value is not exceeded, then the running schedule is highly likely not to experience delay, but if the threshold is exceeded, then a notification is to be issued.

In the next step, step 15, which not necessarily takes place in subsequent order as mentioned, but may also take place prior to any of the other steps, a notification listing of medical staff profiles is obtained. The notification listing contains several profiles for medical staff that is involved in one way or another in one or several of the medical procedures that are listed in the running schedule. Thus, each of the medical staff or stakeholder, may have a different role and corresponding profile. As such, a surgeon role may be directed to a surgeon and the surgeon should be present for example 5 minutes prior to the start of a new medical procedure on the schedule. Accordingly, the notification listing may contain a surgeon role and corresponding 5 minute notification value. The listing also contains profiles for any other role of stakeholder, e.g. OR assistants, patent preparation nurses, instrument delivery staff, OR preparation staff, OR cleaning staff, instrument pickup staff. Each role, thus each profile has a specific corresponding preparation time value.

Once the profiles or at least those profiles involved in the scheduled medical procedures have been obtained, in the next step, step 16, the for each of the medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures of the running schedule affected by the running medical procedure to exceed the threshold value, the preparation time value of a corresponding of medical staff profile is obtained. As such, it is known if it is likely for the running medical procedure to be delayed, or to end earlier, and also which roles of stakeholders may be effected by this, such on a per- role basis. Subsequently in the final step 17, each individual stakeholder is notified prior to a medical procedure of the running schedule in correspondence with the determined preparation time value.

Preferably, the threshold value to determine if the running schedule is forecasted to be delayed (or to finish earlier), may also be comprised of multiple threshold values or to be used in correspondence with a certainty indicator value. The certainty indication value may be communicated to the stakeholders as well. A high certainty factor or indication value, e.g. above 80%, above 90%, or even above 95%, may lead to the system accepting the estimated end-time as a final end time. Based on that, additional notifications may be issued such as a suggestion to reschedule future procedures when a delay is larger than the usual buffers would allow. Or to suggest a reschedule of future procedures when a procedure finished earlier and rescheduling would lead to significant efficiency increase. Or to automatically reschedule surrounding activities (e.g. preparing of a patent for a procedure) to fit the new schedule when a re-schedule is confirmed.

In figure 2 an example is shown of a notification system 20 for providing feedback to stakeholders 24 based on real-time progress analysis of the medical procedures performed in an OR. The system 20 is comprised of at least one computer system 21. The computer can be a conventional physical computer system or be comprised of one or several virtual machines in a local or remote data centre. A hybrid solution is possible as well, wherein a local client system is communicating with other local components of the system, e.g. the sensors from the OR, and wherein the actual processing of the data is performed in a remote data centre, hence in a cloud based solution.

The computer 21 comprises plural components, some for sake of clarity not shown, e.g. memory and one or several processing units. The computer at least comprises a communication unit or communication means 22. With the communication means 22 the computer can have wireless and/or hard-wired communication with all actors and components such as the stakeholders 24, being the nurses, surgeons, instrument delivery staff, etc., but also with the sensors 25 from the OR and the hospital information system 26.

The computer 21 also comprises a validation unit or validation engine 23. The validation engine is arranged to perform the forecasting of the time duration of the medical procedures based on input received through the communication means 22 from the sensors 25 and the hospital information system 26.

The computer 21 starts with receiving 22 a schedule or planning from the hospital information system 26. This schedule is the initial schedule that is created prior to the actual execution of the schedule. That is where the procedure starts. This schedule could be entered manually by a planner, or be automatically computer generated by an incorporated or stand-alone planning system from the hospital. In the present disclosure, the hospital information system 26 provides the schedule to the computer 21. This schedule is thus either a prediction based on the experience of the planner or based on historical planning data from within the single hospital. Such planning systems go beyond the scope of this invention and the skilled person will appreciate how such systems can cooperate. Once the schedule, which is considered the initial schedule, is obtained, the schedule may be validated by making a forecast of the time duration of each medical operation or procedure in the schedule. This validation may thus be performed within the hospital information system 26 or within the computer 21 by the validation engine 23. Once the initial schedule is validated, it may be taken into operation. During running the schedule, i.e. in operation, the progress of the current medical procedures is being monitored by OR sensors 25. These sensors 25 generate real-time medical procedure tracking data from within the OR. This way the progress of the procedure in the OR becomes visible. Several ways exist of obtaining the data. This could for example be done be visual motion tracking sensors which track the position and motion of staff and/or medical equipment in the OR. Based on this data, together with timestamp data, an estimate can be made of the progress of the medical procedure. It may for example be known that if the surgeon leaves the OR, the medical procedure may run towards the end, or when a heart-lung machine is enabled, or disabled, that the scheduled time of the procedure may be exceeded. Other types of tracking may also apply. For example, by detecting presence or absence of the medical instruments with solar cells, or by several types of indoor tracking systems based on radio frequency beacons, magnetic beacons, visual detection, etc. The skilled person will appreciate which techniques may apply.

The thus obtained real-time tracking data from the OR sensors 25 is communicated through the communication means 22 of the computer and forwarded to the validation engine 23. The validation engine uses it for a new forecast of the time duration or more exact, the estimated remaining time duration of the current, running medical procedure. This may be done by comparing timestamps of the actual sensor data, i.e. the running medical procedure tracking data, with historical data. As such, it can be estimated if the procedure is ahead of time, on time, or delayed.

Once the validation engine has made an estimate of the progress of the present medical procedure, the validation engine may determine if a predetermined threshold value is exceeded. If this is the case, then further actions should take place. First a notification listing is obtained. This could be a listing present within the computer 21 or within the hospital information system 26. The listing contains at least individual data per type of stakeholder role. Thus, for example a nurse may have a different role than the surgeon. Each role may have a different preparation time and as such a different notification time as well. The surgeon should for example be present 5 minutes prior to the start of the procedure, and an instrument pickup employee for example 5 minutes after the procedure has ended. Based on the data values in the list, and knowing which actors, i.e. stakeholders, are scheduled in the next procedures, each stakeholder can be informed by the computer 21 on in a role- based manner. Thus, surgeons are notified 5 minutes prior the actual start of the next procedure in the schedule, and the OR preparation employees for example 15 minutes prior to the start, whereas the instrument pickup employees are notified 5 minutes after the procedure has ended.

Accordingly, a system is provided that is able to make efficient use of capacity of the OR by accurate, actual progress monitoring and appropriate role-based information notification of all stakeholders.

To this end, the present disclosure is further also directed to minimizing this effect of loss of time of the OR, or inefficient usage of time of the OR. It is proposed to have better insight in the actual progress of the surgery and to forecast an estimated end-time that is both accurate and actual. What is meant herewith, is that in stead of waiting for the surgery to have ended, to determine if the surgery ended in accordance with its schedule, the progress is monitored real-time. The real-time monitoring is provided by obtaining data from the OR itself. By receiving sensor data from the OR, the system according to the present disclosure can determine if the surgery is still on-schedule or not, and if measures have to be taken towards any of the involved parties.

In accordance with an aspect of the present disclosure, such a method 30 is proposed in figure 3, which may be implemented as a computer controlled method of scheduling operating rooms. The method 30 can be performed by a scheduling or workflow engine and may comprise plural steps.

In the first step, step 31 , an initial schedule is obtained for the one or more ORs. This schedule comprises plural sequential medical procedures, as well as a list of the corresponding medical staff that is involved in each of these medical procedures. This schedule may be obtained from an external hospital planning system or workflow system or may be entered manually.

Once the initial schedule is obtained, in the next step 32, historical schedule data is obtained as well. This data consists of a plurality data elements that comprise medical procedures, allocation of equipment, allocation of medical staff, patient data, and interrelations between said data elements. As such, the data elements may be stored in a (relational) database or on a data storage system in the form of a simple flat file data format. Other data formats and locations may be applicable as well. The skilled person will appreciate which alternatives are applicable.

All or at least relevant parts of historical data belonging to, or being related to the schedule in one way or the other is thus known to the system. On the basis of this data the system, in the next step 33, can then validate the initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of said initial schedule. The validating by forecasting may thus be performed by comparing the medical procedures of the initial schedule with medical procedures of the historical schedule, for those having a predetermined amount of corresponding data elements and interrelations. As such, the validating is done by inputting historical data into a forecast algorithm of a workflow engine. This is however still a forecast, not an actual measurement of the progress of the schedule. The historical data may not only contain data related to the medical procedures, allocation of equipment, staff and patent data as well as the intra- relational data between the elements, but may also comprise historical medical procedure tracking data elements obtained from an operating room. Thus, historical, non-live data originated from sensors in an OR. Examples of such sensors are solar cells and/or an array of photodiodes that detect presence/absence of medical instruments from an instrument tray. This may be considered one of many ways of determining progress of a medical procedure in an OR.

After this step, the schedule is ready to be used. Once the schedule is in use, and one of the medical procedures from the schedule is being executed, the schedule becomes the current or running schedule. Contrary to known hospital schedule systems, the progress of the running schedule is not opaque, amongst others due to the fact that medical procedure tracking data is obtained in real-time in step 34. The use of certain sensors in the OR, for example in the form of solar cells and/or an array of photodiodes that detect presence/absence of medical instruments from an instrument tray, may be a way of determining progress of the medical procedure. Obtained real-time sensor data may be input in an algorithm to determine whether the use of certain instruments corresponds exactly to, or takes place earlier or later in time than predicted.

The sensor data is used in step 34 to validate the current running schedule by making a new time duration forecast. This is done in validation step 35. In this step a new forecast is made, by inputting both the real-time medical procedure tracking data into an artificial intelligence routine, as well as the historical medical procedure tracking data. The outcome is a prediction or estimation of the deviance from the initial forecast such that the system can determine if a threshold value is exceeded. If the threshold value is not exceeded, then the running schedule is highly likely not to experience delay, but if the threshold is exceeded, then a notification is to be issued.

Finally, when it is determined that the forecasted time duration exceeds the predetermined threshold, in step 36 a notification is issued. The notification may be issued to at least one of the involved parties, i.e. stakeholder. Preferably, the method also comprises further steps of updating the initial schedule to incorporate the new modifications. Hence, if the running medical procedure is delayed (or finishes earlier), then the current running schedule may be updated to anticipate the delay (or earlier finish). For example, the next medical procedure on the schedule may be postponed or removed from the schedule. Once the schedule has been updated, the stakeholders may be notified of the new schedule and when they are expected to be present in the OR.

With the invention, a reliable validation of an OR schedule can be obtained. Whereas known scheduling systems are only able to incorporate historical data from within the hospital, and/or rely on the level of experience of the planning employee, the scheduling method according to the invention is able to take all available and relevant parameters into account, e.g. such as historical data of the type of medical procedure, team that has executed the procedure, patient parameters, day of the week, time of day, etc. All aspects may be taken into account in the step(s) of validating the schedule. Besides these aspects that are taken into account prior to the execution of the schedule, the invention proposes to also take real time medical procedure tracking data into account once the schedule is being executed. During the execution of the schedule, the real-time tracking data is used to detect deviations from the schedule as early as possible. An artificial intelligence engine may perform forecasts of the current procedure. These forecasts may be performed at certain moments in time, or on a continuous basis. If a deviation is forecasted, and it is determined that the deviation exceeds a certain threshold, then the stakeholders may be notified appropriately.

In figure 4 an example is shown of a scheduling system 40 for generating and validating at least one Operating Room, OR, schedule that comprises allocation of equipment and medical staff.

The system 40 is comprised of at least one computer system 41. The computer can be a conventional physical computer system or be comprised of one or several virtual machines in a local or remote data centre. A hybrid solution is possible as well, wherein a local client system is communicating with other local components of the system, e.g. the sensors from the OR, and wherein the actual processing of the data is performed in a remote data centre, hence in a cloud based solution.

The computer 41 comprises plural components, some for sake of clarity and obviousness are not shown, e.g. memory and one or several processing units. The computer at least comprises a communication unit or communication means

42. With the communication means 42 the computer can have wireless and/or hard wired communication with all actors and components such as the stakeholders 44, being the nurses, surgeons, instrument delivery staff, etc., but also with the sensors 46 from the OR and the hospital information system 45.

The computer 41 also comprises a validation unit or validation engine

43. The validation engine is arranged to perform the forecasting of the time duration of the medical procedures based on input received through the communication means 42 from the sensors 46 and the hospital information system 45.

The computer 41 may run a routine that starts with the communication means or module 42 of the computer 41 to obtain a schedule from a hospital information system 45. This schedule is considered the initial schedule that is created prior to the actual execution of the schedule. This schedule could have been entered into the hospital information system 45 manually by a planner. The schedule may however also be the outcome of a automatic computer generated schedule by an incorporated or stand-alone planning system from the hospital. In the present disclosure, the hospital information system 45 provides the schedule to the computer 41. This schedule is thus either a prediction based on the experience of the planner or based on historical planning data from within the single hospital. Such planning systems go beyond the scope of this invention and the skilled person will appreciate how such systems can cooperate. Once the schedule, which is considered the initial schedule, is obtained, the schedule may be validated by making a forecast of the time duration of each medical operation or procedure in the schedule.

Contrary to known scheduling systems, the scheduling system 40 of the present disclosure also takes historical data into consideration. The historical data is obtained from one or several databases 47 which may contain data either only from the local hospital, or preferably from multiple hospitals. The historical data is thus preferably directed to an aggregated set of data from several hospitals that have been anonymized to remove identifiable particulars or details that for example breach the privacy of the patients. The validation engine 43 uses the plurality of historical data 47 to validate the initial schedule and to preferably take as many possible variables into account as possible, e.g. type of procedure, team of stakeholders that executed the procedure, medical equipment used, patient data, day of the week, time of day, etc. The validation engine, and in particular, a machine learning algorithm, may use the historical data to validate the current, initial schedule prior to the execution of the schedule. This way an assessment is made of the likelihood that the medical procedures in the schedule are finished at the scheduled time. If this is not the case, hence, if it is very likely that the procedure is delayed to such an extent that is exceeds a certain threshold, then appropriate measures may be taken. The initial schedule may then be corrected or updated and validated again. The updating or correction may be done manually, or by an automated update process of the validation engine 43. This is however optional.

Upon taking the initial schedule into operation, the schedule becomes the running schedule. The progress is then monitored through sensors from the OR 46. These sensors generate real-time data, also referred to as medical procedure tracking data. The data can be generated through several ways, for example through visual motion tracking sensors which determine and track the position of the staff in the OR and/or the medical equipment within the OR. Based on this data, together with timestamp data, an estimate can be made of the progress of the medical procedure. It may for example be known that if the surgeon leaves the OR, the medical procedure may run towards the end, or when a heart-lung machine is enabled, or disabled, that the scheduled time of the procedure may be exceeded. Other types of tracking may also apply. For example, by detecting presence or absence of the medical instruments with solar cells, or by several types of indoor tracking systems based on radio frequency beacons, magnetic beacons, visual detection, etc. The skilled person will appreciate which techniques may apply.

The thus obtained real-time tracking data from the OR sensors 46 is communicated through the communication means 42 of the computer and forwarded to the validation engine 43. The validation engine uses it for a new forecast of the time duration or more exact, the estimated remaining time duration of the current, running medical procedure. This may be done by comparing timestamps of the actual sensor data, i.e. the running medical procedure tracking data, with historical data. As such, it can be estimated if the procedure is ahead of time, on time, or delayed.

Once the validation engine has made an estimate of the progress of the present medical procedure, the validation engine may determine if a predetermined threshold value is exceeded. If this is the case, then further actions should take place.

These actions can relate to just notifying stakeholders, or to also update the schedule to coop with the new forecast. As such, a system is provided that is able to make efficient use of capacity of the OR by generating and validating the OR schedule and to notify the stakeholders of any deviations from the schedule in an accurate and timely manner.

Other variations to the disclosed embodiments can be understood and effected by those skilled in the art in practicing the claimed invention, from a study of the drawings, the disclosure, and the appended claims. In the claims, the word "comprising" does not exclude other elements or steps, and the indefinite article "a" or "an" does not exclude a plurality. A single processor or other unit may fulfil the functions of several items recited in the claims. The mere fact that certain measures are recited in mutually different dependent claims does not indicate that a combination of these measures cannot be used to advantage. A computer program may be stored/distributed on a suitable medium, such as an optical storage medium or a solid- state medium supplied together with or as part of other hardware, but may also be distributed in other forms, such as via the Internet or other wired or wireless telecommunication systems. Any reference signs in the claims should not be construed as limiting the scope thereof.

Claims

1. A computer controlled method of notifying medical staff involved in performing medical procedures in at least one operating room, said method being performed by a notification engine and comprising the steps of:

obtaining (1 1) an initial schedule of said at least one operating room, said initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of said medical procedures;

validating (12) said initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of said initial schedule based on historical schedule data;

obtaining (13), during running said medical procedure of said validated schedule, real-time medical procedure tracking data from said operating room in which said medical procedure is being performed;

validating (14) said running schedule by forecasting a time duration of said running medical procedure based on said real-time medical procedure tracking data and historical medical procedure tracking data; and determining if said forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value, and wherein said method further comprises the steps of:

obtaining (15) a notification listing comprising a plurality of medical staff profiles and corresponding preparation time value;

determining (16), for each of said medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures of said running schedule affected by said running medical procedure to exceed said threshold value, a preparation time value of a corresponding of medical staff profile;

notifying (17) said medical staff prior to a medical procedure of said running schedule in correspondence with said determined preparation time value.

2. The computer controlled method of notifying according to claim 1 , wherein said method further comprises:

3. The computer controlled method of notifying according to claim 2, wherein said medical staff member is notified prior to a medical procedure through said communication protocol of said first communication attribute and subsequently through said communication protocol of said second communication attribute upon expiration of a non-response timer.

4. The computer controlled method of notifying according to claim 2, or 3, wherein said notifying of said medical staff member comprises sending a notification message to said medical staff member which comprises context awareness data and receiving a feedback based on said context awareness data.

5. The computer controlled method of notifying according any of the previous claims, wherein said real-time medical procedure tracking data is obtained from one or more sensors in said operating room.

6. The computer controlled method of notifying according any of the previous claims, wherein said sensors comprise one or more of the group consisting of an optical object recognition system, optical object tracking system, inertial sensor system, a mechanical sensor system, a radio frequency sensor system, a magnetic sensor system.

7 The computer controlled method of notifying according to any of the previous claims, wherein said steps of validating comprise the use of machine learning.

8. The computer controlled method of notifying according to any of the previous claims, wherein said steps of validating comprise the use of machine learning and wherein both said validated initial schedule as well as said obtained real-time medical procedure tracking data are used to improve said machine learning algorithm for validating future schedules.

9. The computer controlled method of notifying according to any of the previous claims, wherein said method further comprises the step of: notifying a schedule planner upon during said validation of said initial schedule said forecasted time duration exceeds said threshold value.

10. The computer controlled method of notifying according to any of the previous claims, wherein said method further comprises the step of:

updating said initial schedule and performing said step of validating said updated initial schedule until said updated initial schedule is validated.

1 1. The computer controlled method of scheduling operating room according to any of the previous claims, wherein said medical staff comprise operating room personal at least comprising one of a surgeon, anaesthesiologist, nurse, operating department practitioner and cleaning staff, and said equipment comprise at least one of a plurality of medical equipment such as a heart/lung machine, anaesthesia machines, surgical instruments, blood-pressure monitor.

12. A notification system (20) comprising at least one computer system (21) running a notification engine arranged for notifying medical staff (24) involved in performing medical procedures in at least one operating room, said system (20) comprising communication means (22) and a validation engine (23), said system being arranged for:

obtain, by said communication means (22), of an initial schedule of said at least one operating room, said initial schedule comprising a plurality of sequential medical procedures, as well as allocation of a plurality of equipment and medical staff for each of said medical procedures;

validating, by said validation engine (23), said initial schedule by forecasting a time duration of each medical procedure of said initial schedule based on historical schedule data;

obtaining, by said communication means (22), during running said medical procedure of said validated schedule, of real-time medical procedure tracking data (25) from said operating room in which said medical procedure is being performed;

validating, by said validation engine (23), said running schedule by forecasting a time duration of said running medical procedure by forecasting a time duration said running medical procedure based on said real-time medical procedure tracking data (25) and historical medical procedure tracking data; and determining if said forecasted time duration exceeds a predetermined threshold value, and wherein said method further comprises the steps of:

obtaining, by said communication means (22), of a notification listing comprising a plurality of medical staff profiles and corresponding preparation time value;

determining, by said validation engine (23), for each of said medical staff allocated to any of the medical procedures of said running schedule affected by said running medical procedure to exceed said threshold value, a preparation time value of a corresponding of medical staff profile;

- notifying, by said communication means (22), of said medical staff prior to a medical procedure of said running schedule in correspondence with said determined preparation time value.

13. A computer program comprising instructions which, when the program is executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous claims 1-1 1.

14. A computer-readable storage medium comprising instructions which, when executed by a computer, cause the computer to carry out the steps of the method of any of the previous claims 1-1 1.

15. A data carrier signal carrying the computer program of claim 13.