Consideration of system of systems and service systems as complimentary approaches for healthcare problems

The purpose of this paper is to consider key features of a system of systems and service systems approach in the context of healthcare service. The investigation is motivated by the increasing demand for improvement in patient outcomes in terms of quality, reliability and cost of care. We hypothesize that an integration of system of systems and service systems approaches may yield benefits in terms of both correct and complete representation of healthcare services and applicability of associated modeling tools to solve problems. The paper shows an initial mapping of this integration after the salient features of the two bodies of knowledge are described in the context of an information intensive healthcare delivery system.