College of Healthcare Operations Management

The POMS College of Healthcare Operations Management (CHOM) is pleased to announce a one-day conference in Chicago, IL, on Thursday, April 19, 2012, the day before the POMS annual meeting. This event is a collaboration between CHOM and the Northwestern University Program for Value and Innovation in Healthcare Delivery (NUVIHD) of the Northwestern Memorial Hospital.

This conference aims to facilitate the growing needs of healthcare researchers and practitioners to better connect with each other. The challenges facing healthcare necessitates active exchange of ideas between all concerned, in order to develop solutions that are innovative, practical and sustainable.

This conference provides a venue for discussion between those working within healthcare and those researching healthcare problems. The conference will bring physicians, nurses, and hospital administrators together with operations management researchers to share what works, what doesn’t and why, and which areas need greater attention. Specifically, this conference will provide presentations from practitioners discussing how operations management helps healthcare. Additionally, the conference will provide a forum for roundtable discussions between practitioners and researchers to explore new areas of research and interest. Finally, the conference will include a tour of a hospital and a chance for a poster presentation. This one day conference is meant to complement the POMS annual meeting as it gives attendees a chance to listen to practitioners and allows time for brainstorming new research ideas.

Registration fees for the conference are $90 for non-students and $45 for students. Detailed agenda and further information will be coming shortly. We will follow first-come-first-serve for participation in the conference and the round table discussion. So look out for future announcements!

Please feel free to contact any of the organizers:

Best Paper Competition
Production and Operations Management Society Conference, Chicago, April 20-23, 2012

The College of Healthcare Operations Management of the Production and Operations Management Society (POMS) announces its 2012 Best Paper Competition. The best paper competition is held each year to identify and honor outstanding papers in the field of Healthcare Operations Management. Each submitted paper will be judged based on its contribution towards the advancement of theory and practice of Healthcare Operations Management. The research should have relevance to theory and have a potential to impact practice. The topic of the paper should fall within the scope of healthcare operations management. All research methods, including field/case studies, empirical and analytical methods are encouraged. There are four conditions for eligibility:

• The paper must present original research conducted primarily by the entrant following the POMS rules for conference submissions (i.e., cannot be previously published or currently accepted for publication elsewhere, etc.)
• Only one paper can be submitted by an entrant.
• Entrant must be the first author on the paper.
• Entrant must register for the conference (Chicago, April 20-23, 2012) and should follow the Abstract and Full Paper submission process as provided in the timeline below.

Timeline for submission:

1. Upload abstract of the paper for presentation at the POMS conference using the website (opens Nov. 1) – the tentative deadline for abstract submission is Dec 15, 2011. Please upload your paper either as an invited or contributed presentation in the Healthcare Track.
2. Upload full-length paper in the POMS Conference management system by Jan 30, 2012.
3. Send an email to Prof. Rachna Shah (shahx024@umn.edu) expressing your desire for being considered for the paper competition by Jan 30, 2012. Include the title of the paper, list of authors and the confirmation number of the abstract/uploaded paper in this email.
4. Register for the conference as per the registration deadline.

Between three and five finalists will be chosen, and their presentation will be moved to a special award session at the 2012 Annual POMS conference in Chicago. Prizes will be awarded immediately at the end of this session. The first prize is accompanied by a $500 honorarium and the second prize is accompanied by a $250 honorarium. A complete entry includes:

1. A cover document that includes:
   • the entrant’s name, current affiliation, address, e-mail address, telephone number;
   • the title of the paper, its topic, and the method(s) used.
   • the file name should be the entrant’s full name.
2. The paper in PDF including tables, figures and appendices should not exceed 32 pages in standard format (1” margins, double-spaced, 12 point font). Author names should not appear on the paper. Please see other formatting requirements at http://www.poms.org/journal/author_instructions/

Click here for abstracts from the Reno conference

The mission of the POMS College of Healthcare Operations Management is to improve the ability of health care systems around the globe to deliver high quality care efficiently and effectively by encouraging operations management research, training and dialog among key health care stakeholders, including researchers, health care providers, decision-makers, policy-makers, and patients.

Please see the CHOM bylaws (Word format) for additional detail on management of the College.

President: Vikram Tiwari (University of Houston)
VP Meetings: Linda Laganga (Mental Health Center of Denver)
VP Awards: Rachna Shah (University of Minnesota)
VP Outreach: David Dobrzykowski (Eastern Michigan University)
Treasurer : Keith Willoughby (University of Saskatchewan)
Secretary: Carrie Queenan (University of Notre Dame)