Preferences for specific work schedules: foundation for an expert-system scheduling program.

An expert system was developed to schedule nurses according to their preferences for specific schedules. The first step in this project was to determine the reliability and stability of nurses' schedule preferences. If nurses' preferences changed frequently, the proposed expert system would not have been feasible. Our results show that for a 3- to 6-month period most nurses are consistent in their preferences of schedules. While each nurse is unique, cluster analysis indicates that it is possible to group nurses according to desire for tour.