Tag: healthcare

We are pleased to let you know that this autumn we will be present at some of the most prestigious medical events in China.

Over a year ago,  Multitone EkoTek system won the Best Communication System Award within the Building Better Healthcare ceremony. Since then, the product has attracted a lot of positive customer feedback.  Multitone recently released a video illustrating how the product provides wireless protection for staff members operating in challenging work environments. The PDD team was […]

Human Factors and Ergonomics contribute towards Digital Health by providing an understanding of the healthcare system, making sure we get the right tool for the job and making sure that the tool fits and fit for purpose.

Conducting any kind of patient-centric evaluation can present numerous challenges; preparing for and conducting evaluation sessions with patients suffering from sensitive and changeable conditions (such as Alzheimer’s) can present even more complex challenges, as we found out on a study we conducted in the past year.

Following our successful transition in June to the latest 2016 revision of ISO13485, we were certified in November for a further 3 years for our client services in research, design, engineering, pre-production manufacture, verification and validation.

PDD has completed its planned transition to the latest version of this rigorous international quality assurance standard for medical devices, building on the success of earlier transitions and successful audits to the FDA 21CFR Part 820 in 2015.

An extract taken from Chris Vincent’s knowledge piece that discusses the growing use of digital platforms such as social media to understand how people really use medical products.

The consumer goods sector (FMCG, apparel, automotive, electronics) has always had greater freedom to explore design research in comparison to the Pharma industry, which is significantly more restricted. One of the problems with a stricter and more constrained set of rules is that it can curb innovation by creating limitations in the approach Pharma companies take during the development process and justification for when Patient Centred Design comes into debate. Often regulatory walls can slow the development of a new products and services and directly affect the time taken to introduce a new product to market.

In my recent blog post on patient-centricity, I highlighted that the pharma industry has over the past years embarked on a journey towards more patient-centricity and that this trend actually has broad support across key players. At the same time, even with the best of intentions, it will take time for this new ethos to be truly embedded in the business practices of all pharma companies.

Last Thursday I got the opportunity to learn about the latest and greatest in VR and its applications in healthcare, courtesy of Health Tech Women. Over the course of 2 hours, the Virtual Reality Breakfast event in London showed how VR really is no longer just about video gaming and is being used to transform healthcare across a range of therapy areas.

In this first post of a three-part series, we look at the state of patient-centricity in the pharma industry today. In recent times, the pharma industry has increasingly adopted the mantra of“patient-centricity” which aims to put the patient at the heart of the company’s operation. The reality, however, still looks very different. Many are quick […]

All too often our health care is taken for granted, and we assume it will always be available to serve our community’s needs. The question is “How healthy are our healthcare facilities to handle the diversity of services and to produce healthy outcomes for an expansive and unprecedented market of six (6) living generations – all distinctively different with a diverse set of needs and priorities?”

Chris Vincent and I recently attended an AAMI training course held in Dublin on Human Factors for Medical devices. EU manufacturers and consultancies all attended with the hope of having some questions answered by the FDA.

Despite the many brands and models of drug infusion delivery devices available there are only a few different basic types of device. Considering the breadth of therapeutic application, physical infusion volumes and the economic context, the healthcare provider has a diminished choice and the patient (often the user) has barely any.

How do you measure usability? How do you really measure the efficiency of interface characteristics and user satisfaction in a way that can feed opportunities to develop and innovate? As a usability consultant, it is not that uncommon to be asked to evaluate usability. Some would even go so far as to say it comes with the territory.

Earlier this week, I attended an event at Imperial College on Innovation in Medtech. The event was well attended by academics and a diverse group of industry representatives from pharma and medical device companies, start-ups, consultancies and investors.

As a follow on from my previous blog, with more technology being used to treat patients, user interface (UI) design is key to making devices safe and effective. Patients aren’t the only ones who need good UIs however, Health Care Professionals (HCPs) are more reliant than ever on technology to do their job and this is only set to rise. They – more than most – need informative, error proof UIs especially considering errors kill 12,000 patients a year in the UK and no doubt cause complications for many more. Here are a few design recommendations tailored to designing devices with the needs of health care professionals in mind.

It’s no secret that our healthcare bill is increasing. Worldwide, healthcare spending is at a record high, and an expanding and aging population means this shows no sign of slowing down any time soon.

FMEAs (Failure Modes and Effects Analysis) are a common tool used in industry by device manufacturers to help members of R&D think of risk mitigation strategies to embed within their process whilst they are in the product development stages. FMEAs traditionally focus on system/component failures that can affect the operation of a device whilst UFMEAs (User Failures Modes and Effects Analysis) are intended to help members of R&D to focus on use-related errors. The term ‘Use Error’ has recently been introduced to replace the commonly used terms ‘Human Error’ and ‘User Error’, after the need to change the term was prompted by a high number of manufacturers commonly attributing errors to the users as opposed to investing in fixing error-prone device design.

In Human Factors the art of asking a good question that is non-leading yet to the point, simple yet scenario driven, open yet has boundaries to stop people going off on a tangent, whilst trying to get the user to answer as honestly as possible sounds like a breeze doesn’t it? Think again!