Impacts of decentralization in health systems in the state of São Paulo, Brazil.

The p-median approach was capable of optimizing a wide range of scenarios with an average running time of less than 2 hours and 30 minutes while considering a large dataset of more than 4,000 locations. In spite of some shortcomings, such as estimation of Euclidean distances, the method is simple yet powerful enough to be considered a useful tool to assist decision makers in the distribution of resources, and facilities across large areas with high number of locations to be supplied.