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Published 5/21/2020

MAY NEWSLETTER

Check out what we've been up to since February!

A Note From Our President

Dear friends and colleagues,

    Between COVID-19 work and the recent HFES Virtual Symposium, I know everyone's been busy, so I'll keep this brief. It’s hard to believe that the website went up only 8 months ago, but we will be passing the 100 member mark this week! Had we envisioned such rapid growth, we might have been a little more prepared... I joke, but I also appreciate the patience everyone has extended us as we navigate running this network. Since our last newsletter, we’ve had two COVID-19 Webinars and I want to extend a special thank you to our presenters. I am consistently inspired by the work you are doing. You all have really exemplified the values of our network. We all may have different roles and expertise, but share a common philosophy, to make the world a better place.

 

Your President,

   Sarah Fouquet, PhD

   Children's Mercy Hospital Kansas City

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HFTH Spotlight:

10 Questions in 10 Minutes!

This month's HFTH Spotlight is SQ Yin, PhD!

Read SQ's complete interview here.

1) What is your job title?

"Assistant Director, Human Factors & Systems Design at KK Women's & Children's Hospital in Singapore."

2) Why did you go into human factors?

"I started as a pilot trainee... My love for flight and flying led me here."

3) Why did you go the healthcare route?

"I didn’t choose the healthcare life. The healthcare life chose me..."

4) Why did you decide to be embedded as opposed to work in academia or industry?

"The opportunity to directly impact and change actual systems motivates me. The difference between working in a health system versus a medical company is the opportunity to gain and exercise a diverse set of HF knowledge and skills..."

 

5) What do you enjoy most about being an embedded HF practitioner?

"Actually saving lives. If only I have a newspaper wall like in the movie The Kingsman..."

 

6) What is one piece of advice you would give up-and-coming HF professionals who want to be embedded in healthcare?

"Learn to Google quickly and discreetly. While you don’t need an MD for this job, you will be working with lots of medical jargon and there’s only so many times you can ask clarifying questions in a room."

 

8) What is your dream superpower?

"I agree with the late Stan Lee: 'Luck'"

 

9) If you could be a member of any TV show family, which would it be?

"Rick and Morty"

What People Are Doing

The last few months, we have hosted two HFTH and COVID-19 Webinars for our members to share projects and information. View previous webinars, Webinar 1 and Webinar 2, and take a look at what our presenters have been working on lately.

HFTH and COVID-19 Webinar

March 26th, 2020

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Laura Barg-Walkow, PhD, is part the Children's Hospital Colorado COVID-19 command center and currently dedicates 100% of her time to COVID-19 projects. Being the only HF practitioner at a hospital can be intimidating for some, but not Laura. In her presentations she shares her experiences in creating PPE donning and doffing signs, N95 mask decontamination, re-naming "universal masking" to reduce confusion and strategies for conducting quick usability testing with front-line staff.

     Now... Laura is creating safe screening and check-in stations in compliance with social distancing guidelines. She is implementing plastic screen protectors at check-in locations to keep everyone in the hospital safe.

 

SQ Yin, PhD, believes that COVID-19 is not just the hospital's responsibility, but requires the involvement of the entire community. In his presentation, he shares his engagement in the response of COVID-19 at KK Women's & Children's Hospital in Singapore. His hospital's first priority is adapting the current hospital environment. This includes creating decontamination zones, secure areas for healthy patients and a social-distancing-compliant admission flow. The hospital also strategically deploys hospital resources, such as sending back-office staff to screening floors, in an attempt to optimize all employees.

     Now... SQ is determining what the new "norm" will be in Singapore. He is designing systems both for safe social-distancing and providing remote care. He says, "HF can help define the new norm and we can't let HFE sciences be an after-thought, again."

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Laura Barg-Walkow, PhD: laura.barg-walkow@childrenscolorado.org

Shanqing Yin, PhD: yin.shanqing@kkh.com.sg

2nd HFTH and COVID-19 Webinar

April 30th, 2020

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Dr. Irina G Trifonova, MD, is a front-line Attending Pediatric Hospitalist at NewYork-Presbyterian Queens. She shares her experiences and challenges on the front-lines in New York as the COVID-19 pandemic swept the state. Her presentation focuses on her experiences as a Pediatric Hospitalist caring for adult COVID patients when her unit converted to adult care.

     Now... Irina's Pediatric Department is working to safely re-open the Pediatric Units for pediatric patients, as the number of COVID patients in NYC gradually decreases.

 

Neal Wiggerman, PhD, presents HillRom's new method using lift equipment and straps to enable as few as 3 caregivers to prone a patient with no manual handling.

    Now... Neal is assisting to create a few training materials for the method, including an instructional video, live-action training demo and a proning manuscript.

 

Brittany Anderson-Montoya, PhD, shares her experience in joining Atrium Health's Infection Prevention Planning Team. Through this involvement she assisted to create step-by-step PPE donning and doffing visual aids intended for use by 70,000 employees. In her presentation, she also applauds the surrounding communities' participation in "Mask Mondays." Each Monday, community members drop off masks that are donated to the hospitals.

    Now... Brittany is working on the Patient Safety Adverse Event Investigation program to incorporate needed modifications for investigations that have arisen due to COVID-19.

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Irina Trifonova, MD: irt9019@nyp.org

Neal Wiggerman, PhD: neal.wiggermann@hillrom.com

Brittany Anderson-Montoya, PhD: brittany.anderson-montoya@atriumhealth.org

Save the date for our 3rd HFTH and COVID-19 Webinar

 

When: Thursday, June 4th, 2020

Time: 10:00am - 11:30am (CT) | 11:00am - 12:30pm (ET) | 8:00am - 9:30am (PT)

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Image by Ben White

What Articles We're Reading

Have you heard? SEIPS 3.0 is out!

The Systems Engineering Initiative for Patient Safety (SEIPS) model provides a framework for integrating human factors (HF) and ergonomics in healthcare and patient safety. As healthcare becomes increasingly distributed, the "process" component of the SEIPS model must evolve and represent the additional complexity. This paper reviews different ways the process component of the SEIPS models have been described and applied. The SEIPS 3.0 model proposes that the process component, using the concept of the patient journey to describe the spatio-temporal distribution of patients' interactions with multiple care settings over time. This new SEIPS 3.0 socio-technical systems approach to the patient journey and patient safety poses several conceptual and methodological challenges to HF researchers and professionals.

Join Our Network

Complete the Membership Application to request HFTH membership.

 

We cannot wait to work with you!

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