This volume presents a wide range of medical applications that can utilize mathematical computing. This work grew out of a workshop on optimization which was held during the 2005 CIM Thematic Term on Optimization in Coimbra, Portugal. It provides an overview of the state-of-the-art in optimization in medicine and will serve as an excellent reference for researchers in the medical computing community and for those working in applied mathematics and optimization.

A systematic review of the most current decision models and techniques for disease prevention and treatment Decision Analytics and Optimization in Disease Prevention and Treatment offers a comprehensive resource of the most current decision models and techniques for disease prevention and treatment. With contributions from leading experts in the field, this important resource presents information on the optimization of chronic disease prevention, infectious disease control and prevention, and disease treatment and treatment technology. Designed to be accessible, in each chapter the text presents one decision problem with the related methodology to showcase the vast applicability of operations research tools and techniques in advancing medical decision making. This vital resource features the most recent and effective approaches to the quickly growing field of healthcare decision analytics, which involves cost-effectiveness analysis, stochastic modeling, and computer simulation. Throughout the book, the contributors discuss clinical applications of modeling and optimization techniques to assist medical decision making within complex environments. Accessible and authoritative, Decision Analytics and Optimization in Disease Prevention and Treatment: Presents summaries of the state-of-the-art research that has successfully utilized both decision analytics and optimization tools within healthcare operations research Highlights the optimization of chronic disease prevention, infectious disease control and prevention, and disease treatment and treatment technology Includes contributions by well-known experts from operations researchers to clinical researchers, and from data scientists to public health administrators Offers clarification on common misunderstandings and misnomers while shedding light on new approaches in this growing area Designed for use by academics, practitioners, and researchers, Decision Analytics and Optimization in Disease Prevention and Treatment offers a comprehensive resource for accessing the power of decision analytics and optimization tools within healthcare operations research.

During public health emergencies such as terrorist attacks or influenza outbreaks, the public health system's ability to save lives could depend on dispensing medical countermeasures such as antibiotics, antiviral medications, and vaccines to a large number of people in a short amount of time. The IOM's Forum on Medical and Public Health Preparedness for Catastrophic Events held a workshop on November 18, 2009, to provide an overview of current threats, recent progress made in the public health system for distributing and dispensing countermeasures, and remaining vulnerabilities.

On March 3-4, 2008, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) Forum on Medical and Public Health Preparedness for Catastrophic Events hosted a workshop titled "Medical Countermeasures Dispensing." The overall objective was to discuss a range of solutions to rapidly provide medical countermeasures to protect large numbers of people prior to or during a public health emergency, such as a bioterrorist attack or infectious disease outbreak. The United States is currently unprepared to confront the range of threats it is facing, such as an intentional anthrax release, severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), or pandemic influenza, and it must plan aggressively to counteract the threat of these and other future public health emergencies. Countermeasure dispensing must harness all types of imaginative partnerships between public and private institutions, working together in ways tailored to meet individual community needs. This workshop summary highlights the presentations and subsequent discussion that occurred at the workshop.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 6th International Conference on Integration of AI and OR Techniques in Constraint Programming for Combinatorial Optimization Problems, CPAIOR 2009, held in Pittsburgh, PA, USA, in May 2009. The 20 revised full papers and 10 extended abstracts presented together with 2 invited talks were carefully reviewed and selected from 65 submissions. The papers describe current research in the fields of constraint programming, artificial intelligence, and operations research and present new techniques or new applications in combinatorial optimization, thus exploring ways of solving large-scale, practical optimization problems through integration and hybridization of the fields' different techniques.

The goal of the Encyclopedia of Optimization is to introduce the reader to a complete set of topics that show the spectrum of research, the richness of ideas, and the breadth of applications that has come from this field. The second edition builds on the success of the former edition with more than 150 completely new entries, designed to ensure that the reference addresses recent areas where optimization theories and techniques have advanced. Particularly heavy attention resulted in health science and transportation, with entries such as "Algorithms for Genomics", "Optimization and Radiotherapy Treatment Design", and "Crew Scheduling".