Information flow in the major trauma treatment bay

Impact

When a severely injured patient arrives to the resuscitation station, the research of NCAD research team noted that: 

• Important patient information is repeated, written down or passed on verbally up to five times.
• Trauma team members arrive to the trauma bay at different times and have to refer to physical checklists and charts to get an overview of the trauma case
• The trauma team may not know the other people in the room by name or expertise, which has a negative impact on communication
• One small screen displays the patient’s readings and can be difficult to see depending on the staff member’s location in the room.

Better design of the physical and digital environment of the trauma bay will not only support hospital staff, but also gives patients a better chance at surviving and recovering after a major traumatic incident.

Challenge

As MMUH will be one of the two major trauma centres in Ireland, the trauma bays in resuscitation  need to be of the highest standard to best treat a large number of seriously injured patients. 

How might we display key information of a patient’s condition, in a highly pressurised emergency situation, which can be quickly assimilated by all members of the trauma team, in real-time?

Process

The NCAD research team started by understanding the processes of the prehospital care team, staff in the emergency department and the trauma team in resuscitation. Through ethnographic research and interviews with various members of theatre staff, managers, consultants and clinical facilitators, the team was able to develop a detailed patient journey map to identify opportunities for more effective communication and smoother patient handover. Moreover, observing several trauma simulations at the Royal College of Surgeons Ireland helped to understand the interactions of theatre staff in trauma situations. To explore the feasibility of potential communication flows, solutions were discussed with a consultant in the physical environment of a future trauma bay and discussed with staff in IT to incorporate technical requirements.

Output

The final result of NCAD’s five-week design sprint consists of digital and physical prototype proposals for the future trauma bays. These include a renewed space set-up with a large screen that provides the trauma team with information about the patient’s condition and medical history, as well as checklists to support crucial decision-making.

This project is being continued by the Transformation Office at MMUH and supported by the HSE Spark Innovation Fund for implementation.