Operations Research2  The problem  With the advent of HIV and AIDS in the early 1990s, the City of New Haven instituted a needle exchange program as a way of reducing the spread of infection among intravenous drug users  New Haven asked Yale University to determine if the program was actually making progress in the fight against HIV and AIDS

Operations Research3  Objectives and requirements  Develop a syringe tracking and testing system  Model HIV transmission in New Haven  Estimate model parameters from the data collected in New Haven  Determine if the program is reducing infection rates and saving lives  Recommend continuation or discontinuation of the program.

Operations Research4  The OR solution  Yale researchers developed:  A syringe tracking and testing system to “interview the needles” rather than rely on addicts’ self-reporting  A Needles That Kill (NTK) model to forecast the incidence of new HIV infections  The modelers made adjustments to determine:  Frequency of shared drug injection  Probability that kits given to addicts for cleaning needles were effective  Departure rate from the population  Infectivity per injection  Per syringe exchange rate  Ratio of drug injectors to needles

Operations Research5  The value  The researchers were able to determine that needle exchange reduced the HIV infection rate among program clients by 33%  In response, the Connecticut legislature continued funding the program, expanded needle exchange services to Bridgeport and Hartford, and decriminalized syringe possession  New needle exchange programs and legislation were proposed in New York, California, and Massachusetts as a result

 You are going to invite relatives for your wedding. You have no car. Your parents work from Mon to Sat. You work on a shift system, where sometimes you work during the day and sometimes at night. Your relatives are very dispersed geographically and the number of relatives per region vary substantially. You are thinking to rent a car or get the service of a taxi driver.

 understanding of the essential features, relevance, applications, tools and techniques of Operations Research  management by fact  to apply the different techniques and mathematical models in solving management problems

 1.Understand the importance of operations research in enhancing management decision-making  2.Understand the quantitative approaches,theories and techniques of Operations Research  3.Capture mathematically the problems in key management functions  4.Analyse the different constraints in the identified situation to calculate or simulate optimal solutions