A Two-Stage Stochastic Model for a multi-objective blood platelet supply chain network design problem incorporating frozen platelets

Platelet supply chain (PLT SC) management is always a challenging task for healthcare systems due to the nature of platelets (PLTs). PLTs have an extremely short shelf life and their demand is highly uncertain, which may lead to a high percentage of wastage and shortage in the corresponding PLT SC. This paper proposes a two-stage stochastic programming (2SSP) model to investigate the opportunity of incorporating frozen PLTs (FPLTs) into the PLT SC to see how it can improve the performance of the PLT SC in which the PLTs are used only in liquid form with respect to the platelet shortage, wastage and substitution penalties in transfusions. To investigate a more realistic situation when clear targets of blood shortage, wastage and substitution penalties are available, an extended goal programming model is built based on the proposed 2SSP model. Furthermore, we generate scenarios based on the real data provided by healthcare practitioners using the combination of a top-down forecasting approach and a Monte Carlo based scenario generation method. From the experimental results we note that, when comparing the model that incorporates FPLTs with the one that doesn't, the average reduction rates for platelet shortages, wastage, and substitution penalties in transfusions are 0.55, 0.55, and 0.23, respectively, when 40% of the overall demand is from patients who can receive both liquid PLTs and thawed PLTs sourced from FPLTs (Patient Type I). These rates can be further improved to 0.64, 0.55 and 0.23 or 0.65, 0.55 and 0.23 when 50% or 60% of the total demand is from Patient Type I. Furthermore, in contrast to real-world performance, the output of the 2SSP model, when not incorporating FPLTs, results in notable reductions in platelet shortage, wastage, and substitution penalties by 95%, 56% and 18%, respectively.