Overview
The Emergency Department (ED) is stressful, chaotic, and often understaffed leading healthcare workers (HCWs)
to become physically and mentally exhausted and to experience burnout. Thus, we need to better understand the experiences
of HCWs and how they interact with the built environment of the ED to find ways to reduce their stress and workload.
We utilized design fiction to help facilitate discussions about technology in the ED. We created a design fiction probe,
and then co-designed a design fiction catalog with HCWs. The catalog shows robot prototypes that were created during the interviews with HCWs.
Fictional ED
Our design fiction probe was a model of an imagined, future ED equipped with intelligent systems. We used images of this fictional ED to prompt HCWs to consider the built environment and possible uses for these intelligent systems when discussing problems they experienced in their workplace.
Interviews
We interviewed 12 ED HCWs over zoom. Our interviews had three parts:
Phase I: Understand participants’ experiences in the ED, using a design fiction probe to prompt participants to consider how intelligent systems can improve their workflow within the built environment. Generate storyboards to summarize these experiences.
Phase II: Reflect on the storyboards generated during Phase I, co-design prototypes, and iterate on the designs.
Phase III: Discuss and iterate on the prototypes in the design catalog.
This is one of the storyboards and robots we co-designed with one of the participants during phase I and II of the interviews.
Robots for the Future ED Catalog
As the participants viewed the fictional ED and discussed potential systems that could help solve problems in the ED, we created storyboards and sketches of the prototypes they described. We used blender to visualize the prototypes and created a digital catalog displaying the systems that were co-designed with HCWs.
Findings
Thematic analysis of the interview transcripts revealed three major themes:
1. Supporting privacy and peace through reconfigurable spaces
Participants envisioned systems that would create private spaces for families
to grieve or receive emotionally stressful information. They also discussed reconfigurable spaces to support older adults and patients with mental
health issues or substance abuse issues.
2. Improving patient-HCW communication
Participants designed robots to communicate medical information and provide frequent updates to patients
to minimize the frustrations of long wait times, but also discussed how these systems could lead to alert fatigue.
3. Increasing safety and patient support
Due to the risk of violence in the ED, participants proposed robots for monitoring aggressive behavior and
detecting dangerous objects. They also suggested robots to fetch food, drinks, and blankets to reduce patients’ frustration in the ED and minimize the potential of aggressive behavior.