ProductRules Engine
Put your scheduling rules into the roster.
PlanMyRounds supports 15+ configurable scheduling rules. Hard rules are never broken; soft rules are preferences the engine satisfies as far as the hard rules allow.
Free for up to 10 doctors. No credit card.
Two kinds of rules, kept separate
Hard constraints keep the roster safe and within policy. Soft constraints make it fair and livable. Keeping them apart is what lets PlanMyRounds be both.
Hard rules stay hard
A hard rule is never broken, by a generated roster, a manual edit or a swap. If the rules cannot all be met, the gap is flagged instead.
- Minimum coverage
- Doctor availability
- Required rest
- Maximum working hours
- Shift restrictions
Preferences can be balanced
Soft rules are goals. The engine satisfies them as far as the hard rules allow, for every doctor, not only the most vocal.
- Preferred shifts
- Avoided shifts
- Night-duty preferences
- Workload preferences
See when a rule affects the schedule
When leave and staffing make a rule impossible to meet, PlanMyRounds flags the coverage gap or conflict for review. An admin decides what to do.
Build once. Reuse every roster cycle.
Rules are saved per department and applied to every cycle, so an ICU and a general ward can run different rules in the same hospital.
Hard constraints: always enforced
PlanMyRounds never generates a roster, or approves a swap, that breaks one of these.
| Rule | What it prevents |
|---|---|
| Required doctors per shift | Understaffed shifts |
| Senior and junior composition | A shift with no senior doctor |
| Approved leave | Rostering a doctor who is on leave |
| Doctor availability | Rostering a doctor on a day they cannot work |
| Recovery window between shifts | Going back on duty too soon, especially after a night |
| No unsafe back-to-back long duties | Long duties stacked without a break |
| Mandatory rest days | Weeks with no day off |
| Maximum consecutive workdays | Long unbroken runs of duty |
| Maximum working hours | Hours above your policy or regulation |
| Exclusion rules | New doctors on duties they are not ready for |
Soft constraints: optimized
Within the hard rules, PlanMyRounds works to satisfy these as fully as possible.
- Doctor shift preferences
- Even distribution of night shifts
- Balanced total hours
- Consistent shift types within a week
- Historical fairness across past rosters
- Gentler schedules for newly joined doctors
What you can configure
Every hospital and department sets its own values.
- Shift definitions: name and timing
- Required doctors per shift
- Senior and junior composition
- Minimum and maximum hours
- Consecutive day limits
- Rest period rules
- Department-level policies
Configuration examples
Typical settings for an ICU. They are illustrative; you choose the values that match your policies.
| Rule | Example setting |
|---|---|
| Night shift | 2 doctors, at least 1 senior |
| After a night duty | Off duty until the recovery window you set has passed |
| Consecutive days | No more than the number of consecutive workdays you set |
| New joiners | No solo nights during their first roster |
| Preferences | Honor requested days off where the hard rules allow |
Scheduling rules FAQ
What rules should physician scheduling software handle?
What is the difference between hard and soft constraints?
What happens if the rules cannot all be met?
Can rules differ between departments?
Do shift swaps follow the same rules?
Put your rostering rules to work.
Free for up to 10 doctors. No credit card, no contract.