ABSTRACT
Recently, much emphasis has been put on human factors approaches to patient safety (Bogner, 1994; Cook, Woods, & Miller, 1998; Leape, 1994; Wears & Perry, 2002). The health care field has embraced the various models and approaches to human error and safety to analyze and evaluate risk and improve the quality and safety of care provided to patients in various institutions and venues (Reason, 2000; Vincent, Taylor-Adams, & Stanhope, 1998). In Ergonomics in Design in 2004, Lucian Leape wrote: “Given the complexity of health care and the formidable obstacles it presents to change, to overcome those barriers and create a safe culture does indeed seem to be the ultimate challenge for those who specialize in human factors” (p. 11). This handbook of human factors and ergonomics (HFE) in health care and patient safety addresses the challenge described by Leape by presenting and discussing a variety of HFE issues, concepts, and methods that can help understand, identify, miti gate, and remove the obstacles to safe health care. It includes nine sections with 51 chapters organized in sections:
1. Introduction. 2. Macroergonomics and Systems. 3. Job and Organizational Design. 4. Physical Ergonomics. 5. Technology. 6. Human Error. 7. Human Factors and Ergonomics
Methodologies.
