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"We've currently made a 40 per cent reduction on last year's infection figures ... the commode is definitely part of that", said an Infection Prevention and Control Clinical Nurse Specialist for Scarborough and North East Yorkshire NHS Trust. The commode referred is the result of a joint effort between Brunel University, Kirton Healthcare and PearsonLloyd, in responding to the Design Council's `Design Bugs Out' competition. Designed for thorough cleaning, easy maintenance, and patient dignity, the commode has been widely exhibited in the UK and Europe, and was shortlisted for the BRIT Best Design of the Year (2009) award. Now over 2,000 have been sold to more than 60 hospitals in the UK.
Misconnection errors involve the administration of drugs via the wrong route. For example, the injection of a toxic drug into the spine which should only be injected into a vein. Following a death in 2001 and 13 others in the UK over the previous 15 years, work began to find an engineered solution to misconnection errors. R.Lawton, at the University of Leeds (UoL), evaluated the usability and acceptability and explored the implementation of these different engineered solutions. This research was the basis for the UK National Patient Safety Agency policy and was used by companies to inform the design of these new devices. Ultimately, this research has led to the production of safer devices that are now being purchased by NHS Trusts to reduce patient risk.
Research at Kingston University led by Hilary Dalke has established the beneficial effects of colour design for application in long-term health care environments for people with neural disabilities. This work has led to the development of spatial design principles for improving the experience of service users, patients and staff.
Through her consultancy work with architectural firms, individual NHS hospitals, mental health units, independent charities and healthcare furniture and equipment suppliers such as Hill-Rom, Dalke has influenced their understanding of the issues involved, leading to improved design in hospitals, care homes and day centres, with consequent benefits for patients, staff and visitors in four institutions.
Over the last 15 years the Medical Applications Group (MAG) has engaged in applied research into the use of product design techniques and technologies in medical procedures. Their work has directly led to better, safer, faster, more accurate and less intrusive surgical procedures. The group has worked with surgeons at NHS hospitals all over the UK to deliver well over 2,000 medical models for surgical use during the period. A number of hospitals have adopted MAG's techniques, meaning that the Group's research has improved the dignity, comfort and quality of life of around two and a half thousand people since 2008 whilst saving the UK tax payer many thousands of pounds.
[Throughout this template, references to underpinning research are numbered 1-6; sources to corroborate are numbered 7-15]
Research by the University of Huddersfield's School of Art, Design and Architecture has made a significant contribution towards ensuring that patient safety is a central feature of the rapidly expanding transfer of healthcare from hospitals to the home. By demonstrating that traditional nursing bags can be carriers of disease and creating a 21st-century successor that addresses this longstanding failing, Dr David Swann's pioneering work has generated international interest, influenced design practices and drawn much-needed attention to the dangers of exporting healthcare without hygiene in an age when rises in demand and costs are making non-hospital treatment one of the industry's fastest-growing sectors.
This case study highlights research excellence in health design by a Group of four multi-disciplinary researchers. Collectively the Group of researchers apply user-centred approaches to design and evaluation of products and services which improve health and wellbeing. The Group employs user-engagement throughout the design lifecycle to achieve societal benefits through improved products, information, services, and systems. The research has delivered:
Beneficiaries include end-users of assistive technology, patients with long-term conditions and their carers, medical practitioners, policy makers and commercial organisations.
All too many IT projects fail, as many as 80%. To improve systems design in the public sector, Wastell has undertaken a sustained programme of action research, the main fruit being a design and innovation methodology, known as SPRINT. Its deployment has generated impressive benefits, e.g. a recent project produced an innovative set of tools for improving safeguarding in healthcare. Wastell's research has also highlighted the dysfunctions of the Integrated Children's System (ICS), a national IT initiative in social care. The research directly influenced the redesign of the ICS, feeding into the Munro Review of Child Protection, and has guided subsequent design work on IT for social care.
Design research at the Royal College of Art (RCA) has pioneered projects and studies developing a design-led, systems-based approach to improve patient safety in hospital and mobile healthcare. It has led a multidisciplinary culture in which designers, clinicians, psychologists and business specialists collaborate in development projects. This new approach to Design for Patient Safety has had a profound impact on understanding public service provision, on practice and policy, and has realised commercial benefit.
Between 1992 and 2002, Loughborough University invented an award-winning approach to planning complex, highly interdependent development projects. Since 2008 the Analytical Design Planning Technique (ADePT) method has resulted in:
CHAPMAN's research into emotionally durable design has radically shifted the values and practices of global businesses, helping them to cut waste and to enhance product, material and brand value. Through publications, exhibitions, master-classes and films, this research has transformed understanding of sustainable design in professional (Puma, Sony), policy (House of Lords, UN) and cultural (Design Museum, New Scientist) settings, propelling the field beyond its focus on energy and materials, towards deeper engagements that link psychosocial phenomena with ideas about consumption and waste. Furthermore, it has contributed to public debate and policy with the effect that the term `emotional durability' has now entered the international design lexicon, providing valuable shorthand for complex phenomena influencing product longevity.