Model_based Simulation of Optimal Medical Product Distribution Network

Analyzing the behavior of a medical product distribution network (MED) is quite complex: whether it is for medication access performance or service reliability. The complexity arises due to the combinatorial problem of finding a suitable placement of retail stores and product supply centers in the distribution topology over a geographic region, subject to a set of optimization criteria (considered jointly): such as minimizing the medication access latency experienced by customers and maximizing the MED service reliability in the face of product out-of-stock scenarios in one or more retail stores and/or their supply centers. The key issue dealt with is the complexity arising from the combinatorial nature of the optimal product distribution problem in MED networks. The optimization problem manifests as two sub-problems: i) an optimal placement of the retail stores and supply centers, and ii) an optimal product supply schedule from supply centers to the stores. In the following discussion, we refer to the retail stores and product supply centers as proxy nodes for the original product manufacturer.