Intelligent Information Management, 2011, 3, 56-63 doi:10.4236/iim.2011.32007 Published Online March 2011 (http://www.SciRP.org/journal/iim) Copyright © 2011 SciRes. IIM The BP-M* Methodology for Process Analysis in the Health Sector Antonio Di Leva, Salvatore Femiano Dipartimento di Informatica, Università di Torino, Torino, Italy E-mail: dileva/femiano@di.unito.it Received January 12, 2011; revised January 28, 2011; accepted March 1, 2011 Abstract In this paper we present the main phases of the BP-M* methodology and its application to a care pathway for patients in the Oncology Division of a large hospital, to evaluate pros and cons of different drug administra- tion modalities and the impact of these modalities to the organizational process. BP-M* has been developed for the manufacturing sector but the relevance of business modeling, analysis and reorganization is not re- stricted to a specific sector. The aim of this work is to show its application to a real life study of a complex process in the health sector. Keywords: Methodology for Business Process Analysis, Process Simulation and Reengineering, Care Path- way 1. Introduction This paper presents a methodology, called BP-M* (Busi- ness Process Methodology*), which is a practical approach for the modeling, the quantitative analysis and the reengi- neering of business processes. It will be illustrated by means of the patient’s care pathway in the Oncology Divi- sion of the largest hospital in Torino (Italy), the Azienda Ospedaliera San Giovanni Battista. The management of an integrated care department in modern hospitals is not a simple task. Managers have to: • develop care pathways, • identify participants and roles in the care process, • streamline activities, follow progress and respond to actions and events along the care pathways, • evaluate efficiency and effectiveness of the care process. For an Oncology Division, the relevant process is the chemotherapy administration. Chemotherapy is the use of extremely powerful drugs to destroy cancer cells; therefore it requires a very careful monitoring of patient conditions during drug infusion. The overall process is very complex and requires coordination among several doctors, nurses, pharmacists, laboratory and clerical per- sonnel, and the patient. Therefore we need methods that allow a precise defi- nition of the patient care process and provide qualitative and quantitative information about the process, e.g. [1,2]: • the optimal type and number of resources (staff, rooms, beds, etc.), • existing anomalies in the process (such as bottle- necks, long waiting times,…), • suggestions to improve efficiency, i.e., how to use resources in a better way, how to decrease patient length of stay in the department (cycle time), • type of problems if something new happens (e.g. the workload increases). In the literature, there is a strong support for the analysis and reengineering of healthcare organizations. Enterprise methodologies originally developed for manu- facturing processes are now used to improve the opera- tions and competitiveness of hospitals [3,4]. Both qualitative (e.g. SWOT - Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) and quantitative (e.g. process evaluation based on discrete event simulation) analysis have been exploited in real life applications [5,6,7]. This paper is structured as follows. The second section presents the BP-M* methodology. The third section il- lustrates the case study, which aims to improve the effi- ciency and to optimize the resources management of the target organization. Finally the fourth section presents some preliminary conclusions of our analysis. 2. The BP-M* Methodology BP-M* is based on M*-COMPLEX, a general-purpose