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A System Dynamics Approach for Hospital Waste Management in a City in a Developing Country: The Case of Nablus, Palestine

Al-Khatib, I.A., Eleyan, D. and Garfield, Joy (2016) A System Dynamics Approach for Hospital Waste Management in a City in a Developing Country: The Case of Nablus, Palestine. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 188 (9). pp. 503-511. ISSN 0167-6369 ESSN: 1573-2959

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Abstract

Hospitals and health centers provide a variety of healthcare services and normally generate hazardous waste as well as general waste. General waste has a similar nature to that of municipal solid waste and therefore could be disposed of in municipal landfills. However, hazardous waste poses risks to public health, unless it is properly managed. The hospital waste management system encompasses many factors, i.e., number of beds, number of employees, level of service, population, birth rate, fertility rate, and not in my back yard (NIMBY) syndrome. Therefore, this management system requires a comprehensive analysis to determine the role of each factor and its influence on the whole system. In this research, a hospital waste management simulation model is presented based on the system dynamics technique to determine the interaction among these factors in the system using a software package, ithink. This model is used to estimate waste segregation as this is important in the hospital waste management system to minimize risk to public health. Real data has been obtained from a case study of the city of Nablus, Palestine to validate the model. The model exhibits wastes generated from three types of hospitals (private, charitable, and government) by considering the number of both inpatients and outpatients depending on the population of the city under study. The model also offers the facility to compare the total waste generated among these different types of hospitals and anticipate and predict the future generated waste both infectious and non-infectious and the treatment cost incurred.

Item Type: Article
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Uncontrolled Discrete Keywords: system dynamics modelling, hospital, generation rate, developing countries, Palestine
Subjects: G Geography. Anthropology. Recreation > GE Environmental Sciences
T Technology > T Technology (General)
Divisions: College of Business, Psychology and Sport > Worcester Business School
Related URLs:
Depositing User: Joy Garfield
Date Deposited: 11 Nov 2016 13:41
Last Modified: 02 Oct 2020 08:38
URI: https://eprints.worc.ac.uk/id/eprint/5063

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