The dichotomy of the application of a systems approach in UK healthcare: the challenges and priorities for implementation

Pickup, Laura; Lang, Alexandra; Atkinson, Sarah; Sharples, Sarah

Abstract

There is increasing demand for a systems approach within national healthcare guidelines to provide a systematic and sustainable framework for improvements in patient safety. Supported by this is the growing body of evidence within Human Factors/Ergonomics (HFE) healthcare literature for the inclusion of this approach in health service design, provision and evaluation. This paper considers the current interpretation of this within UK healthcare systems and the dichotomy which exists in the challenge to implement a systems approach. Three case studies, from primary and secondary care, present a systems approach, offering a novel perspective of primary care and blood sampling. These provide practical illustrations of how HFE methods have been used in collaboration with healthcare staff to understand the system for the purpose of professional education, design and safety of clinical activities. The paper concludes with the challenge for implementation and proposes five roles for systems HFE to support patient safety.

Citation

Pickup, L., Lang, A., Atkinson, S., & Sharples, S. (in press). The dichotomy of the application of a systems approach in UK healthcare: the challenges and priorities for implementation. Ergonomics, 61(1), https://doi.org/10.1080/00140139.2017.1306632

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Mar 3, 2017
• Online Publication Date: Mar 24, 2017
• Deposit Date: Mar 14, 2017
• Publicly Available Date: Mar 24, 2017
• Journal: Ergonomics
• Print ISSN: 0014-0139
• Electronic ISSN: 1366-5847
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis Open
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 61
• Issue: 1
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/00140139.2017.1306632
• Keywords: systems, patient safety, human factors, ergonomics, healthcare
• Public URL: http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/id/eprint/41294
• Publisher URL: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00140139.2017.1306632
• Copyright Statement: Copyright information regarding this work can be found at the following address: http://eprints.nottingham.ac.uk/end_user_agreement.pdf
• Additional Information: This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Ergonomics on 24 March 2017, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00140139.2017.1306632