Human factors and ergonomics to improve performance in intensive care units during the COVID-19 pandemic

Valentina Della Torre, Flavio E. Nacul, Peter Rosseel, Heather Baid, Kaushik Bhowmick, Piotr Szawarski, Tapas K. Sahoo, Tughan Utku, Adrian Wong, Manu L.N.G. Malbrain

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic has tested the very elements of human factors and ergonomics (HFE) to their maximum. HFE is an established scientific discipline that studies the interrelationship between humans, equipment, and the work environment. HFE includes situation awareness, decision making, communication, team working, leadership, managing stress, and coping with fatigue, empathy, and resilience. The main objective of HF is to optimise the interaction of humans with their work environment and technical equipment in order to maximise patient safety and efficiency of care. This paper reviews the importance of HFE in helping intensivists and all the multidisciplinary ICU teams to deliver high-quality care to patients in crisis situations.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)265-270
Number of pages6
JournalAnaesthesiology Intensive Therapy
Volume53
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 13 May 2021

Bibliographical note

Distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-NC-SA 4.0). License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/), allowing third parties to copy and redistribute the material in any medium or format and to remix, transform, and build upon the material, provided the original work is properly cited and states its license.

Keywords

  • COVID-19
  • pandemic
  • intensive care
  • human factors
  • resilience
  • leadership
  • Leadership
  • Intensive care
  • COViD-19
  • Human factors
  • Pandemic
  • Resilience

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