Rehabilitation
Increasing rehabilitation therapy hours through a design intervention
Project duration: 6 months
Partners: HSE Spark Innovation Programme, NCAD, Peamount Hospital
Funding: HSE Spark Innovation Programme, Friends of Peamount
Ongoing project which applies a design methodology to explore the challenge of increasing available rehabilitation therapy time for patients at Peamount Hospital
Overview
International best practice guidelines recommend a minimum of 3 hours of rehabilitative therapy per day or at least 15 hours per week. Most rehabilitation centres like Peamount Hospital however are unable to consistently meet these standards.
- For best effect therapy should be timely, specific and consistent yet no therapy is provided on weekends
- Therapists need access to rehabilitation space and equipment yet are often competing for both
- Patients often require special equipment yet there are often delays in acquiring this resulting in delayed discharge
- Due to lack of rehabilitation space, therapy often takes place in non-designated places like hospital corridors.
- “Nothing happens on the weekend!”
— Staff Member
Process
The process approximately follows these steps:
- Scoping the brief
- Research and contextual enquiry
- Data synthesis and problem retraining
- Ideation
- Initial refinement and Iteration of shortlisted ideas
An expert in the design process (Martin Ryan) is providing mentorship for the NCAD research team through the design phases, designing and leading key workshops.
Result
Research is currently being conducted. To date outcomes include visualisation of research findings through an experience flow map. This map allows the wider project team to gain a more holistic view of the context and understand the associated challenges in turn to design a better outcome for patients. Next steps we will be to conduct patient interviews.
