The Role of Human Factors in Home Health Care: Workshop Summary

New report on the impact of human factors on home health care quality and safety is available

A new report funded by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality examines the impact of human factors on home health care quality and safety. The report includes seven commissioned papers on topics that include matching care to people in their home care environment; the prevalence, characteristics, and care provision ability of informal caregivers; medical devices and information technology and systems in home care; impact of social, cultural, and community environments on home care; and the effects of policy, reimbursement, and regulation on home health care. Based on proceedings from an October 2009 workshop, the report, "The Role of Human Factors in Home Healthcare: Workshop Summary and Papers," also features summaries of the discussion at the workshop on how home care quality and safety are impacted by the capabilities and limitations of patients and providers in the use of technologies. The workshop summary report, which is published by the National Academy of Sciences' National Research Council under contract to AHRQ, is available at Web Site. A final consensus report and designers’ guide for home-based consumer health IT developers, which build on the workshop proceedings, are under development and will include recommendations related to the safety and quality of home health care. The report and designers’ guide are expected to be released in Spring 2011.






Description

The rapid growth of home health care has raised many unsolved issues and will have consequences that are far too broad for any one group to analyze in their entirety. Yet a major influence on the safety, quality, and effectiveness of home health care will be the set of issues encompassed by the field of human factors research--the discipline of applying what is known about human capabilities and limitations to the design of products, processes, systems, and work environments.

To address these challenges, the National Research Council began a multidisciplinary study to examine a diverse range of behavioral and human factors issues resulting from the increasing migration of medical devices, technologies, and care practices into the home. Its goal is to lay the groundwork for a thorough integration of human factors research with the design and implementation of home health care devices, technologies, and practices.

On October 1 and 2, 2009, a group of human factors and other experts met to consider a diverse range of behavioral and human factors issues associated with the increasing migration of medical devices, technologies, and care practices into the home. This book is a summary of that workshop, representing the culmination of the first phase of the study.
The Role of Human Factors in Home Health Care: Workshop Summary