ABSTRACT
Research projects that are embedded in the design of a Surgeons Cockpit addressed the following topics in order to address quality in product design.
• A framework to address the surgeon's requirements. • A quality control procedure for equipment. • A method to increase awareness of ergonomic guidelines. • An (inter)national standardized protocol, including standardized actions. • A guideline to improve operation notes. • A more sophisticated ranking system in order to categorize the skills of the
Keywords: Product design, usability, guidelines
Quality in healthcare depends on several factors, varying from the skills of the medical professional and the performance of the medical team, to the quality and usability of the technical equipment. For all of these aspects new initiatives are implemented and evaluated. For example, the effect of CRM (Crew Resource Management) Training is studied in surgical teams(Parker et al. 2007), or the use of a blackbox in the Operating Room (OR) to measure performance(Guerlain et al. 2005). It is known that although protocols for different types of surgery exist that each specialist applies these protocols in a different manner(Wauben et al. 2008). This situation differs completely from other comparable work environments where people's lives are at risk such as in aviation or nuclear/toxic industries. This lack of quality control in medicine contributes to preventable medical errors.
