Value of human factors to medication and patient safety in the intensive care unit.
Conventional wisdom suggests that the "human factor" in critical care environments is reason for inadequate medication and patient safety. "Human factors" (or human factors engineering) is also a scientific discipline and practice of improving human performance. Using decades of human factors research, this paper evaluates a range of common beliefs about patient safety through a human factors lens. This evaluation demonstrates that human factors provides a framework for understanding safety failures in critical care settings, offers insights into how to improve medication and patient safety, and reminds us that the "human factor" in critical care units is what allows these time-pressured, information-intense, mentally challenging, interruption-laden, and life-or-death environments to function so safely so much of the time.
Scanlon
Matthew C
MC
Department of Pediatrics, Critical Care, Medical College of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, WI, USA. mscanlon@mcw.edu
Karsh
Ben-Tzion
BT
D003422:Critical Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D019983:Guideline Adherence; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D007362:Intensive Care Units / Q000592:standards; D008508:Medication Errors / Q000517:prevention & control; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000458:organization & administration; D017410:Practice Guidelines as Topic; D011786:Quality Control; D017751:Safety Management / Q000379:methods*; D014481:United States; D016526:Workload