Towards an "empowered" user role in the design of large-scale electronic patient records

Abstract

We report from a large-scale Electronic Patient Record (EPR) project in Northern Norway where the goal is to design a new type of configurable EPRs that allow users in hospitals to tailor the software to their specific needs. This ability appears to challenge the traditional user role as what we usually understand as ordinary users increasingly undertake a designer role, hence dissolving the boundaries between users and designers. Still, the configurability of the software is not straightforward as it is not obvious who is going to decide how the final design should look like, how much tailoring should be possible and in which situations.

User involvement in design of a safety-critical operating panel system

“…However, the potential beneficiaries of the participatory design may include large numbers of parties other than the direct end-users of the system (e.g., technicians, secretaries, and maintenance personnel). For example, in the healthcare domain, in the design of intensive care units (Nykänen et al, 2016) or large electronic patient record systems (Silsand & Christensen, 2012), many other user groups have also been involved in the planning of systems, as fluent and efficient operation demands multidisciplinary cooperation, without neglecting the experiences of the patients and their families. In these projects, one central aim from the participatory design point of view has been to bring together a group of employees with a diverse set of skills and knowledge who can form powerful and wide-ranging design and development teams.…”

“…Another study reported by Silsand et al (Silsand & Christensen, 2012) was done in connection with the development of a new large-scale Electronic Patient Record (EPR) system for North Norwegian hospitals. The vendor (i.e., DIPS ASA) of the EPR system aimed to offer a modular system to enable users to build their own EPR software and user interface.…”

Empirical study of Team Usability Testing: a laboratory experiment

“…The focus of studies into groupware evaluation varies on a broad scale. Some studies focus on developing groupware and evaluation methods for a specific organization and investigate the effect of collaborative software on groupwork (Christensen and Ellingsen 2014;Pargman 2003;Pinelle et al 2003;Silsand et al 2012;Tang et al 1994;Van der Veer and Weile 2000). Other research focuses on how specific features, particularly awareness supporting features, influence usability (Gutwin et al 1996;Greenberg 1998, 1999;Lopez and Guerrero 2017;Ignat et al 2015;Passos et al 2017;Romero-Salcedo et al 2004).…”