Integrating human factors engineering into your pediatric radiology practice.

Human factors engineering involves the study and development of methods aimed at enhancing performance, improving safety, and optimizing user satisfaction. The focus of human factors engineering encompasses the design of work environments and an understanding of human mental processes to prevent errors. In this review, we summarize the history, applications, and impacts of human factors engineering on the healthcare field. To illustrate these applications and impacts, we provide several examples of how successful integration of a human factors engineer in our pediatric radiology department has positively impacted various projects. The successful integration of human factors engineering expertise has contributed to projects including improving response times for portable radiography requests, deploying COVID-19 response resources, informing the redesign of scheduling workflows, and implementation of a virtual ergonomics program for remote workers. In sum, the integration of human factors engineering insight into our department has resulted in tangible benefits and has also positioned us as proactive contributors to broader hospital-wide improvements.

Improving On-Time Starts for Pediatric Cardiac MRI.

PURPOSE: Delayed start times for cardiac MRI examinations have resulted in longer patient fasts, extended wait times, and poor synchronization of anesthesia induction and contrast administration. The aim of this work was to improve on-time start rates from an initial baseline of 10%. METHODS: A multidisciplinary team comprising members of the cardiac and radiology services used the Realizing Improvement Through Team Empowerment methodology to target the root causes of the delays and enhance workflow. The main factors identified as contributing to examination delays were late patient arrival, variations in patient preparation time, unavailability of equipment, and inefficient scheduling processes. RESULTS: The implementation of various interventions, such as the use of standardized appointment scripts, ensuring timely patient preparation, and ensuring the availability of equipment when required, resulted in an increase in on-time start rates for cardiac MRI examinations to 34%. CONCLUSIONS: The study's systematic approach proved to be valuable in both understanding and resolving the identified problems. Through the continuous application of plan-do-study-act cycles, the authors effectively pinpointed obstacles and tested multiple potential measures to overcome them. This approach made it possible to comprehend the issue and to implement targeted interventions to address it.

A proactive learning approach toward building adaptive capacity during COVID-19: A radiology case study.

The COVID-19 pandemic has challenged organizations to adapt under uncertainty and time pressure, with no pre-existing protocols or guidelines available. For organizations to learn to adapt effectively, there is a need to understand the perspectives of the frontline workforce involved in everyday operations. This study implemented a survey-tool to elicit narratives of successful adaptation based on the lived experiences frontline radiology staff at a large multispecialty pediatric hospital. Fifty-eight members of the radiology frontline staff responded to the tool between July and October of 2020. Qualitative analysis of the free-text data revealed five categories of themes that underpinned adaptive capacity of the radiology department during the pandemic: information flow, attitudes and initiative, new and adjusted workflows, availability and utilization of resources, and collaboration and teamwork. Enablers of adaptive capacity included timely and clear communication about procedures and policies from the leadership to frontline staff, and revised workflows with flexible work arrangements, such as remote patient screening. Responses to multiple choice questions in the tool helped identify the main categories of challenges faced by staff, factors that enabled successful adaptation, and resources used. The study demonstrates the use of a survey-tool to proactively identify frontline adaptations. The paper also reports a system-wide intervention resulting directly from a discovery enabled by the findings based on the use of RETIPS in the radiology department. In general, the tool could be used in concert with existing learning mechanisms, such as safety event reporting systems, to inform leadership-level decisions to support adaptive capacity.

Results of a Virtual Multi-Institutional Program for Quality Improvement Training and Project Facilitation.

OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this project was to describe the results of a multi-institutional quality improvement (QI) program conducted in a virtual format. METHODS: Developed at Stanford in 2016, the Realizing Improvement Through Team Empowerment program uses a team-based, project-based improvement approach to QI. The program was planned to be replicated at two other institutions through respective on-site programs but was converted to a multi-institutional virtual format in 2020 in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The virtual program began in July 2020 and ended in December 2020. The two institutions participated jointly in the cohort, with 10 2-hour training sessions every 2 weeks for a total of 18 weeks. Project progress was monitored using a predetermined project progress scale by the program manager, who provided more direct project support as needed. RESULTS: The cohort consisted of six teams (37 participants) from two institutions. Each team completed a QI project in subjects including MRI, ultrasound, CT, diagnostic radiography, and ACR certification. All projects reached levels of between 3.0 (initial test cycles begun with evidence of modest improvement) and 4.0 (performance data meeting goal and statistical process control criteria for improvement) and met graduation criteria for program completion. DISCUSSION: We found the structured problem-solving method, along with timely focused QI education materials via a virtual platform, to be effective in simultaneously facilitating improvement projects from multiple institutions. The combination of two institutions fostered encouragement and shared learning across institutions.

Using human factors principles to redesign a 3D lab workflow during the COVID-19 pandemic.

BACKGROUND: Like most hospitals, our hospital experienced COVID-19 pandemic-related supply chain shortages. Our additive manufacturing lab's capacity to offset these shortages was soon overwhelmed, leading to a need to improve the efficiency of our existing workflow. We undertook a work system analysis guided by the Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS) construct which is based on human factors and quality improvement principles. Our objective was to understand the inefficiencies in project submission, review, and acceptance decisions, and make systematic improvements to optimize lab operations. METHODS: Contextual inquiry (interviews and workflow analysis) revealed suboptimal characteristics of the system, specifically, reliance on a single person to facilitate work and, at times, fractured communication with project sponsors, with root causes related to the project intake and evaluation process as identified through SEIPS tools. As interventions, the analysis led us to: 1) enhance an existing but underused project submission form, 2) design and implement an internal project scorecard to standardize evaluation of requests, and 3) distribute the responsibility of submission evaluation across lab members. We implemented these interventions in May 2021 for new projects and compare them to our baseline February 1, 2018 through - April 30, 2021 performance (1184 days). RESULTS: All project requests were submitted using the enhanced project submission form and all received a standardized evaluation with the project scorecard. Prior to interventions, we completed 35/79 (44%) of projects, compared to 12/20 (60%) of projects after interventions were implemented. Time to review new submissions was reduced from an average of 58 days to 4 days. A more distributed team responsibility structure permitted improved workflow with no increase in staffing, allowing the Lab Manager to devote more time to engineering rather than administrative/decision tasks. CONCLUSIONS: By optimizing our workflows utilizing a human factors approach, we improved the work system of our additive manufacturing lab to be responsive to the urgent needs of the pandemic. The current workflow provides insights for labs aiming to meet the growing demand for point-of-care manufacturing.

Quantifying Occupational Stress in Intensive Care Unit Nurses: An Applied Naturalistic Study of Correlations Among Stress, Heart Rate, Electrodermal Activity, and Skin Temperature.

OBJECTIVE: To identify physiological correlates to stress in intensive care unit nurses. BACKGROUND: Most research on stress correlates are done in laboratory environments; naturalistic investigation of stress remains a general gap. METHOD: Electrodermal activity, heart rate, and skin temperatures were recorded continuously for 12-hr nursing shifts (23 participants) using a wrist-worn wearable technology (Empatica E4). RESULTS: Positive correlations included stress and heart rate (ρ = .35, p < .001), stress and skin temperature (ρ = .49, p < .05), and heart rate and skin temperatures (ρ = .54, p = .0008). DISCUSSION: The presence and direction of some correlations found in this study differ from those anticipated from prior literature, illustrating the importance of complementing laboratory research with naturalistic studies. Further work is warranted to recognize nursing activities associated with a high level of stress and the underlying reasons associated with changes in physiological responses. APPLICATION: Heart rate and skin temperature may be used for real-time detection of stress, but more work is needed to validate such surrogate measures.

Additive manufacturing (3d printing) in response to a pandemic: Lessons learned at the children's hospital of Philadelphia.

The COVID-19 pandemic produced unprecedented challenges to healthcare and medical device manufacturing (e.g. personal protective device and replacement part shortages). Additive manufacturing, 3D printing, and the maker community were uniquely positioned to respond to these needs by providing in-house design and manufacturing to meet the needs of clinicians and hospitals. This paper reviews the pandemic response of Children's Hospital of Philadelphia CHAMP 3D Lab, a point-ofcare3D printing team that supports clinical and research projects across the hospital network. The CHAMP team responded to a variety of COVID-19 healthcare needs including providing protective eyewear and ventilator components, creating a transport hook, and designing a novel transparent facemask. This case series details our response to these needs, describing challenges experienced and lessons learned in overcoming them so that others may learn from our experiences. Challenges to responding to the pandemic included the need to handle urgent pandemic related requests in addition to our standard fare. This required us to not only expand our capacity without additional resources, but also to develop a system of prioritization. Specific changes made included: streamlining workflows, identifying safety review processes, and developing/enlisting a network of collaborators. Further, we consider how to transition to a future, post-pandemic world without losing the cohesive drive of emergency-induced innovation. This paper aims to share what we have learned and to encourage both teams currently engaged in the printing community and those looking to join it.

Identification of Design Criteria to Improve Patient Care in Electronic Health Record Downtime.

OBJECTIVE: Design criteria specifications (needs, obstacles, and context-of-use considerations) for continuing safe and efficient patient care activities during downtime were identified by using phenomenological analysis. METHODS: Interview transcripts from medical personnel who had experience with downtime incidents were examined using a phenomenological approach. This process allowed for the identification of design criteria for performing downtime patient care activities. RESULTS: A substantial variation in criteria was found from participants in different roles. The differences suggest opportunities to address downtime that may require attention to individual roles. CONCLUSIONS: Workload distribution and communication are significant issues in patient care during downtime. There may not be an equal work distribution, leading to an increased workload for some personnel during downtime. Phenomenological analysis was completed after participants were interviewed, indicating it is a viable post hoc approach. Some downtime criteria were identified as potential guidelines for the development of better downtime contingency plans.

Optimizing Radiology Reading Room Design: The Eudaimonia Radiology Machine.

Physical and mental stressors on radiologists can result in burnout. Although current efforts seek to target the issues of burnout and stress for radiologists, the impact of their physical workspace is often overlooked. By combining evidence-based design, human factors, and the architectural concept of the Eudaimonia Machine, we have developed a redesign of the radiology reading room that aims to create an optimal workspace for the radiologist. Informed by classical principles of well-being and contemporary work theory, Eudaimonia integrates concerns for individual wellness and efficiency to create an environment that fosters productivity. This layout arranges a work environment into purposeful spaces, each hosting tasks of varying degrees of intensity. The improved design addresses the radiologist's work requirements while also alleviating cognitive and physical stress, fatigue, and burnout. This new layout organizes the reading room into separate areas, each with a distinct purpose intended to support the range of radiologists' work, from consultation with other health care providers to reading images without interruption. The scientific principles that undergird evidence-based design and human factors considerations ensure that the Eudaimonia Radiology Machine is best suited to support the work of the radiologists and the entire radiology department.

Ethical Considerations When Using a Mobile Eye Tracker in a Patient-Facing Area: Lessons from an Intensive Care Unit Observational Protocol.

This article describes the process of designing, approving, and conducting an investigator-initiated protocol to use an eye-tracking device in a health care setting. Participants wore the device, which resembles eyeglasses, in a front-facing manner in an intensive care unit for the study of personnel gaze patterns, producing a visual record of workflow. While the data of interest for our study was not specifically the health information protected by the privacy rule of the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), a wide variety of such data was captured by the eye-tracking device, and the prospective consent of all people who might have been incidentally videotaped was not feasible. The protocol therefore required attention to unique ethical considerations-including consent, privacy and confidentiality, HIPAA compliance, institutional liability, and the use of secondary data. The richness of eye-tracker data suggests various beneficial applications in health care occupational research and quality improvement. Therefore, sharing our study's successful design and execution, including proactive researcher-institutional review board communication, can inform and encourage similarly valuable, ethical, and innovative audiovisual research techniques.

Understanding the scope of downtime threats: A scoping review of downtime-focused literature and news media.

Electronic health record downtimes are any period where the computer systems are unavailable, either for planned or unexpected events. During an unexpected downtime, healthcare workers are rapidly forced to use rarely-practiced, paper-based methods for healthcare delivery. In some instances, patient safety is compromised or data exposed to parties seeking profit. This review provides a foundational perspective of the current state of downtime readiness as organizations prepare to handle downtime events. A search of technical news media related to healthcare informatics and a scoping review of the research literature were conducted. Findings ranged from theoretical exploration of downtime to empirical direct comparison of downtime versus normal operation. Overall, 166 US hospitals experienced a total of 701 days of downtime in 43 events between 2012 and 2018. Almost half (48.8%) of the published downtime events involved some form of cyber-attacks. Downtime contingency planning is still predominantly considered through a top-down organizational focus. We propose that a bottom-up approach, involving the front-line clinical staff responsible for executing the downtime procedure, will be beneficial. Significant new research support for the development of contingency plans will be needed.

Continuing Patient Care during Electronic Health Record Downtime.

INTRODUCTION: Electronic health record (EHR) downtime is any period during which the EHR system is fully or partially unavailable. These periods are operationally disruptive and pose risks to patients. EHR downtime has not sufficiently been studied in the literature, and most hospitals are not adequately prepared. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study was to assess the operational implications of downtime with a focus on the clinical laboratory, and to derive recommendations for improved downtime contingency planning. METHODS: A hybrid qualitative-quantitative study based on historic performance data and semistructured interviews was performed at two mid-Atlantic hospitals. In the quantitative analysis, paper records from downtime events were analyzed and compared with normal operations. To enrich this quantitative analysis, interviews were conducted with 17 hospital employees, who had experienced several downtime events, including a hospital-wide EHR shutdown. RESULTS: During downtime, laboratory testing results were delayed by an average of 62% compared with normal operation. However, the archival data were incomplete due to inconsistencies in the downtime paper records. The qualitative interview data confirmed that delays in laboratory result reporting are significant, and further uncovered that the delays are often due to improper procedural execution, and incomplete or incorrect documentation. Interviewees provided a variety of perspectives on the operational implications of downtime, and how to best address them. Based on these insights, recommendations for improved downtime contingency planning were derived, which provide a foundation to enhance Safety Assurance Factors for EHR Resilience guides. CONCLUSION: This study documents the extent to which downtime events are disruptive to hospital operations. It further highlights the challenge of quantitatively assessing the implication of downtimes events, due to a lack of otherwise EHR-recorded data. Organizations that seek to improve and evaluate their downtime contingency plans need to find more effective methods to collect data during these times.

Implications of electronic health record downtime: an analysis of patient safety event reports.

Objective: We sought to understand the types of clinical processes, such as image and medication ordering, that are disrupted during electronic health record (EHR) downtime periods by analyzing the narratives of patient safety event report data. Materials and Methods: From a database of 80 381 event reports, 76 reports were identified as explicitly describing a safety event associated with an EHR downtime period. These reports were analyzed and categorized based on a developed code book to identify the clinical processes that were impacted by downtime. We also examined whether downtime procedures were in place and followed. Results: The reports were coded into categories related to their reported clinical process: Laboratory, Medication, Imaging, Registration, Patient Handoff, Documentation, History Viewing, Delay of Procedure, and General. A majority of reports (48.7%, n = 37) were associated with lab orders and results, followed by medication ordering and administration (14.5%, n = 11). Incidents commonly involved patient identification and communication of clinical information. A majority of reports (46%, n = 35) indicated that downtime procedures either were not followed or were not in place. Only 27.6% of incidents (n = 21) indicated that downtime procedures were successfully executed. Discussion: Patient safety report data offer a lens into EHR downtime-related safety hazards. Important areas of risk during EHR downtime periods were patient identification and communication of clinical information; these should be a focus of downtime procedure planning to reduce safety hazards. Conclusion: EHR downtime events pose patient safety hazards, and we highlight critical areas for downtime procedure improvement.