Department of Management

Dr Alison Harper

Dr Alison Harper

Lecturer
Operations and Analytics

University of Exeter
Building:One
Rennes Drive
Exeter EX4 4ST

Alison Harper joined the University of Exeter Business School in September 2023 as part of the Centre for Simulation, Analytics, and Modelling (CSAM), after working for three years with the Peninsular Centre for Healthcare Operations Research and Data Science at Exeter Medical School. She has a PhD in Managment Studies (Operations Research) and an MSc in Healthcare Human Factors/Ergonomics.  

 

ORCID:0000-0001-5274-5037

 

Current Research:

SCOPE: Simulation for Coordination of Orthopaedic Elective Patient Services 

SCOPE is pilot work with the purpose of developing a hybrid discrete-event simulation/agent-based model. The objective is to better capture system complexities than a single method alone for planning, coordinating, and resourcing orthopaedic emergency and elective care, with the aim of minimising cancelled elective surgery. It is funded by EPSRC through LEAP and partnered with Royal Devon University Hospitals.  It runs until 2026.  See CSAM webpage for more information.

STARS: Sharing Tools and Artefacts for Reproducible Simulations in healthcare.

STARS aims to improve the quality and quantity of shared discrete-event simulation models, tools, and other research artefacts in healthcare through the development of a new framework for sharing computer models, online interactive training materials for knowledge transfer, user testing, and support for simulation journals to adopt open science principles. It is funded by MRC and is led by UEMS, and runs until 2026.

NHSquicker

The NHSquicker project commenced in 2017. The project's current iteration includes further development (NHSquicker version 3), extension of functionality (integration with national DOS system) and impact evaluation. NHSquicker is a real-time solution informing attendance choices for urgent care - the NHS Quicker platform.

 

Previous recent research projects include:

Improving Patient flow between Acute, Community and Social care (IPACS)

This 3-year project was funded by HDRUK and was in collaboration with NHS Bristol, North Somerset and South Gloucester (BNSSG) Integrated Care Board, and University of Bath School of Management.The IPACS project aimed to optimaise the balance of capacity along complex hospital discharge pathways and assess how responsive total spend in the local health and social care economy might be in relation to the capacity of commu nity and home-based care.

Hospital Efficiency Project (HEP)

This HDRUK-funded project in collaboration with University of Bristol and North Bristol NHS Trust aimed to support North Bristol to manage orthopaedic surgery elective waiting lists. The model was co-designed to support capacity planning, and was developed for reuse, deployed as a web apps.


Research interests:

  • Real-time decison-support
  • Real time simulation
  • Hybrid modelling
  • Discrete event simulation
  • Health service delivery
  • Open modelling

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