An Erlang-based stochastic model for patient flow

In this paper, an Erlang-based stochastic model for patient flow is present ed. The model is proposed as an effective tool to obtain analytic results f or the stochastic process of patient flow in a health care environment. Thr ough the use of two previously published examples, it is shown that the sto chastic model can be developed quickly, is not computationally intensive an d provides a good representation of the empirical patient flow. (C) 2000 El sevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.