A Novel MDCM Approach for Sustainable Supplier Selection in Healthcare System in the Era of Logistics 4.0

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has led to major disruptions in workflows across all industries. All sectors are trying to sustain operations during this extremely difficult time and the healthcare sector is the most important of them. It is unthinkable to stop the operations of the health system because it serves human life. Health institutions must supply the products such as masks, gloves, and ventilators subject to service on time for certain activities to continue indefinitely under all conditions. By adopting modern logistics activities and technologies, healthcare organizations can provide sustainable diagnosis and treatments to patients by automating their various operations. With the COVID-19 pandemic, how to select an appropriate sustainable supplier has become an important task in the era of Logistics 4.0. From this viewpoint, a sustainable supplier selection framework is implemented for a health institution under the effect of the pandemic. To determine the direct effects of the pandemic in the health sector, fuzzy Multi-Criteria Decision-Making (MCDM) methods are utilized in the application. After a thorough review of the literature and interviews with experts, the criteria are organized in a comprehensive hierarchical structure. The fuzzy Best-Worst Method (F-BWM) technique is employed to find the weights for the determined criteria. Consequently, the fuzzy Additive Ratio Assessment Method (F-ARAS) method was applied to rank the alternative suppliers. In addition, with a comprehensive sensitivity analysis, alternative situations are examined against possible breaks in the supply chain. Thus, from the perspective of Logistics 4.0 and sustainability, this study contributes to the literature with an analysis of the health system’s survival in difficult and fragile periods, such as COVID-19. Investigating the importance of SSS can be a road map for the policymakers and the decision-makers is beneficial since the impact of COVID-19 on SSS is studied from the perspective of Logistics 4.0.