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Neuromarketing, which is an interdisciplinary area, concentrates on evaluating consumers’ cognitive and emotional reactions to different marketing stimuli. In spite of advantages, neuromarketing still requires development and lacks a strong theoretical framework. Techniques that are used in neuromarketing studies have different superiorities and limitations, and thus, there is a need for the evaluation of the relevance of these techniques. The purpose of this study is to introduce a novel integrated approach for the neuromarketing research area.

The proposed approach combines 2-tuple linguistic representation model and data envelopment analysis to obtain the most efficient neuromarketing technique. It is apt to handle information provided by using both linguistic and numerical scales with multiple information sources. Furthermore, it allows managers to deal with heterogeneous information, without loss of information.

The proposed approach indicates that functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) is the best performing neuromarketing technology. Recently, fMRI has been widely used in neuromarketing research. In spite of its high cost, its main superiorities are improved spatial and temporal resolutions. On the other hand, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) and positron emission tomography (PET) are ranked at the bottom because of their poor resolutions and lower willingness of participants.

This paper proposes a common weight data envelopment analysis (DEA)-based decision model to cope with heterogeneous information collected by the experts to determine the best performing neuromarketing technology. The decision procedure enables the decision-makers to handle the problems of loss of information and multi-granularity by using the fusion of 2-tuple linguistic representation model and fuzzy information. Moreover, a DEA-based common weight model does not require subjective experts’ opinions to weight the evaluation criteria.

In a rapidly changing environment, many health-care systems are forced to survive with rising costs and the need for proper resources utilization. To address the requirements for effective strategic planning, business process reengineering (BPR) is inevitable for health-care systems. This study aims to focus on the reengineering of central sterilization unit’s business processes to obtain performance improvement and efficiency. With the obtained new process design, it is expected to get standardization in all level of the central sterilization unit.

This paper presents a BPR method for modeling the system in health-care sector to improve the productivity of the sterilization process of surgical equipment. The case study is conducted in a large hospital in Istanbul, Turkey. First, “as-is” process is modeled and the problems are determined. Then, solution methods are developed and the target system (to-be process) is redesigned and the workflows of each phase are remodeled by using ARIS tool. Enterprise resource planning (ERP)-driven BPR is used to reengineer the current processes and the future processes are operated through the modeled ERP system. Finally, by using a statistical analysis, performance of the new process is compared with the existing process using the first data obtained from the case hospital.

In many sterilization services, the control procedures are rarely used. Thus, an ERP solution is developed to automate sterilization tasks and track down the information flow. With the ERP solution, it is possible to track in which dates, where and by whom the items are processed. On the other hand, in the sterilization process, the sets are used efficiently according to the last sterile dates of the items. Also, with the ERP system, it is possible to reduce unnecessary paper usage and this gives the hospitals the opportunity to be more ecological and sustainable. As a result, a centralized sterilization process with an IT support provides efficiency, economy and patient safety.

This study seeks for the potential benefits of an ERP implementation in health-care sector. As a result of this project, improvements in productivity, cost and quality are expected in sterilization processes because the new process design will bring automation, human-related error reduction and equipment tracking system. For this purpose, a business process management software is developed and implemented to the central sterilization unit so that the information flows more safely and the managers can track the results quickly by charts and reports.