Shape Matters: A Neglected Feature of Medication Safety : Why Regulating the Shape of Medication Containers Can Improve Medication Safety

This paper aims to highlight how to reduce medication errors through the implementation of human factors science to the design features of medication containers. Despite efforts to employ automation for increased safety and decreased workload, medication administration in hospital wards is still heavily dependent on human operators (pharmacists, nurses, physicians, etc.). Improving this multi-step process requires its being studied and designed as an interface in a complex socio-technical system. Human factors engineering, also known as ergonomics, involves designing socio-technical systems to improve overall system performance, and reduces the risk of system, and in particular, operator, failures. The incorporation of human factors principles into the design of the work environment and tools that are in use during medication administration could improve this process. During periods of high workload, the cognitive effort necessary to work through a very demanding process may overwhelm even expert operators. In such conditions, the entire system should facilitate the human operator's high level of performance. Regarding medications, clinicians should be provided with as many perceptual cues as possible to facilitate medication identification. Neglecting the shape of the container as one of the features that differentiates between classes of medications is a lost opportunity to use a helpful characteristic, and medication administration failures that happen in the absence of such intentional design arise from "designer error" rather than "user error". Guidelines that define a container's shape for each class of medication would compel pharmaceutical manufacturers to be compatible and would eliminate the confusion that arises when a hospital changes the supplier of a given medication.

Age Differences and the Acceptance of Infusion Pump Technology

Previous studies demonstrate that age and receptiveness to new technologies tend to be negatively correlated. Using data from a sample of 311 nurses in a large teaching hospital in the midwestern United States, this study sought to determine whether age predicted satisfaction perceptions of infusion pump technology. Hierarchical regression indicated that the relationship between age and infusion pump satisfaction was not statistically significant, but it also revealed interesting moderation effects. When perceived support for infusion pump use was low, age was negatively related to infusion pump satisfaction. However, when perceived support was high, age was positively related to infusion pump satisfaction.

An extended protocol for usability validation of medical devices: Research design and reference model

This paper proposes and demonstrates an extended protocol for usability validation testing of medical devices. A review of currently used methods for the usability evaluation of medical devices revealed two main shortcomings. Firstly, the lack of methods to closely trace the interaction sequences and derive performance measures. Secondly, a prevailing focus on cross-sectional validation studies, ignoring the issues of learnability and training. The U.S. Federal Drug and Food Administration's recent proposal for a validation testing protocol for medical devices is then extended to address these shortcomings: (1) a novel process measure 'normative path deviations' is introduced that is useful for both quantitative and qualitative usability studies and (2) a longitudinal, completely within-subject study design is presented that assesses learnability, training effects and allows analysis of diversity of users. A reference regression model is introduced to analyze data from this and similar studies, drawing upon generalized linear mixed-effects models and a Bayesian estimation approach. The extended protocol is implemented and demonstrated in a study comparing a novel syringe infusion pump prototype to an existing design with a sample of 25 healthcare professionals. Strong performance differences between designs were observed with a variety of usability measures, as well as varying training-on-the-job effects. We discuss our findings with regard to validation testing guidelines, reflect on the extensions and discuss the perspectives they add to the validation process.

How external and internal resources influence user action: the case of infusion devices

Human error can have potentially devastating consequences in contexts such as healthcare, but there is a rarely a simple dichotomy between errors and correct behaviour. Furthermore, there has been little consideration of how the activities of users (erroneous and otherwise) relate to the conceptual fit between user and device, despite the fact that healthcare technologies are becoming increasingly prevalent and complex. In this article, we present a study in which nurses' conceptions of infusion device practice were elicited to identify misfits. By focusing on key concepts that users work with when setting up infusions and the extent to which the system supports them, our analysis highlights how actions are influenced by the different resources available to users including: the device itself; supporting artefacts; the conceptual understanding of the user; and the community of practice the user is part of. The findings reveal the ways in which users are resourceful in their day-to-day activities and also suggest potential vulnerabilities within the wider system that could threaten patient safety. Our approach is able to make previously under-explored aspects of practice visible, thus enabling insight into how users act and why.

Combining situated Cognitive Engineering with a novel testing method in a case study comparing two infusion pump interfaces

We validated the usability of a new infusion pump interface designed with a situated Cognitive Engineering approach by comparing it to a reference interface using a novel testing method employing repeated measurements and process measures, in addition to traditional outcome measures. The sample consisted of 25 nurses who performed eight critical tasks three times. Performance measures consisted of number and type of errors, deviations from a pre-established normative path solution, task completion times, number of keystrokes, mental effort and preferences in use. Results showed that interaction with the new interface resulted in 18% fewer errors, 90% fewer normative path deviations, 42% lower task completion times, 40% fewer keystrokes, 39% lower mental effort and 76% more subjective preferences in use. These outcomes suggest that within the scope of this case study, combining the situated Cognitive Engineering approach with a novel testing method addresses various shortcomings of earlier testing methods.

Functional safety of health information technology

In an effort to improve patient safety and reduce adverse events, there has been a rapid growth in the utilisation of health information technology (HIT). However, little work has examined the safety of the HIT systems themselves, the methods used in their development or the potential errors they may introduce into existing systems. This article introduces the conventional safety-related systems development standard IEC 61508 to the medical domain. It is proposed that the techniques used in conventional safety-related systems development should be utilised by regulation bodies, healthcare organisations and HIT developers to provide an assurance of safety for HIT systems. In adopting the IEC 61508 methodology for HIT development and integration, inherent problems in the new systems can be identified and corrected during their development. Also, IEC 61508 should be used to develop a healthcare-specific standard to allow stakeholders to provide an assurance of a system's safety.

An alternative point of view: getting by with less: what's wrong with perfection?

OBJECTIVE

Predictions about the future impact of technologic and process innovations inspire optimistic visions. Optimism and speculation require a counterweight. Because results often do not turn out as expected, anticipating failure is useful, and anticipating unintended consequences is visionary.

MEASUREMENTS

A history of unfulfilled prognostications was explored with the intent of finding something essential to the complexities of medicine. Do missed predictions signal another side to innovation that also helps us uncover new information about our world?

MAIN RESULTS

Serendipity is an important theme in medical innovation. There is no reason to think this will change. Things do not necessarily go as planned, but often the results are as important as the original prediction was supposed to be. It will not be clear where we end up until we get there.

CONCLUSIONS

Ideal goals are useful but speculative and subjective. There in fact might be several ideals and contingency is important. The detours and incidental stops on the way to an ideal are more fruitful than the goal itself.

Nurses' acceptance of Smart IV pump technology

BACKGROUND

"Smart" intravenous infusion pumps (Smart IV pumps) are increasingly being implemented in hospitals to reduce medication administration errors.

OBJECTIVES

This study examines nurses' experience with the implementation and use of a Smart IV pump in an academic hospital.

METHOD

Data were collected in three longitudinal surveys: (a) a pre-implementation survey, (b) a 6-week-post-implementation survey, and (c) a 1-year-post-implementation survey. We examined: (a) the technology implementation process, (b) technical performance of the pump, (c) usability of the pump, and (d) user acceptance of the pump.

RESULTS

Initially, nurses had a somewhat positive acceptance of the Smart IV pump technology that significantly increased one year after implementation. User experiences associated with the pump in general improved over time, especially perceptions of pump efficiency. However, user experience with the pump implementation process and pump technical performance did not consistently improve from the pre-implementation survey to the post-implementation survey. Several characteristics of pump technical performance and usability influenced user acceptance at the one-year post-implementation survey.

DISCUSSION

These data may be useful for other institutions to guide implementation and post-implementation follow-up of IV pump use; other institutions could use the survey instrument from this study to evaluate nurses' perceptions of the technology. Our study identified several characteristics of the implementation process that other institutions may need to pay attention to (e.g., sharing information about the implementation process with nurses).

Attitudes toward medical device use errors and the prevention of adverse events

BACKGROUND

The design of a device's user interface often contributes to the chance of a user making an error in using the device. However, there is evidence that most such errors that occur in practice are attributed solely to the user and that the primary method of error prevention is to retrain the user. Yet this attitude may decrease the quality of error reports and the use of more effective error prevention strategies. A qualitative study was conducted to assess health care employees' attitudes toward device use errors and the prevention of adverse events.

METHODS

Twenty-six health care employees from three hospital systems, including 11 device users and 15 nonusers who had participated in infusion pump purchasing decisions were given a scenario describing a device use error involving an infusion pump. Several open-ended questions assessed what they felt led to the event and how they would prevent the event from reccurring.

RESULTS

The top three reported types of factors leading to the adverse event, in decreasing order of frequency, were the user, pump design problems, and lack of training. The top three prevention strategies reported by the participants were retraining the user, redesigning the device, and telling the user to be careful.

DISCUSSION

These results suggest that health care employees still put too much emphasis on the traditional view of blaming and retraining the user.

Getting to the point: developing IT for the sharp end of healthcare

Healthcare demonstrates the same properties of risk, complexity, uncertainty, dynamic change, and time-pressure as other high hazard sectors including aviation, nuclear power generation, the military, and transportation. Unlike those sectors, healthcare has particular traits that make it unique such as wide variability, ad hoc configuration, evanescence, resource constraints, and governmental and professional regulation. While healthcare's blunt (management) end is more easily understood, the sharp (operator) end is more difficult to research the closer one gets to the sharp end's point. Understanding sharp end practice and cognitive work can improve computer-based systems resilience, which is the ability to perform despite change and challenges. Research into actual practice at the sharp end of healthcare will provide the basis to understand how IT can support clinical practice. That understanding can be used to develop computer-based systems that will act as team players, able to support both individual and distributed cognitive work at healthcare's sharp end.