Vancouver Coastal Health, Shift-to-Shift Nurse Handoffs, Spring 2012

iPad App

Abstract

Vancouver Coastal Health (VCH) approached our third-year communication
design class at Emily Carr University of Art and Design and asked us to design
an innovative strategy to improve the shift-to-shift nurse handoffs in its hospitals. 
Such handoffs refer to situations where information about current patients is passed
from one or one set of formal caregivers to another. Unfortunately, during these
situations key information is sometimes lost or forgotten, which can result in an
increased risk to the patient’s health. We propose that a mobile technological 
platform (such as an iPad) be introduced into the nurses’ care system to improve 
communication, reduce error in the handoff process, and enhance overall patient
care. Through extensive secondary research, we examined the process of nurse-
to-nurse hand-offs currently in place and how to improve them, as well as ways
that iPads are being used in various health care institutions. We also conducted
primary research through personal interviews with two nurses, observing an actual
shift-to-shift nurse handoff at Vancouver General Hospital, and conducting two co-
creation sessions with nurses from VCH. After several iterations, a concept was
developed for an iPad interactive health care app that is called Your Patient Circles.
This app puts patient care at the forefront and ensures that important information
about patients is more consistently shared between shift staff, thus improving 
patient health care overall.

This design was created in colaboration with Bree Galbraith, Craig Fleisch, and myself.
The following video promotes our concept and explains how it works.