Browsing by discipline "Käytettävyystutkimus"

According to recent research, Finnish doctors feel excluded from healthcare IT development and suffer from stress caused by poor usability. Active participation in usability evaluation could help involve doctors into developmental work, but new methods are needed. The objective of this study was to find out if a heuristic approach produces plausible results when a group of end-user physicians is used as evaluators. Heuristic walkthrough using a modified set of Nielsen’s heuristics and clinical tasks was performed to evaluate usability of a widely used Electronic Health Record (EHR). Medical students and doctors with no previous experience in usability evaluation and 1) with or 2) without prior experience in using the EHR in question were recruited as evaluators. A control group of usability experts was used. Physicians were able to locate usability problems, ranging from cosmetic flaws to problems concerning patient safety and significant hindrance for work. Analysis of the found usability problems revealed that experienced EHR users discovered usability problems in nearly all major functions within the given EHR scenario and time span, whereas novice users more likely discovered usability problems that could occur when learning to use a new EHR. Using physicians as evaluators in a heuristic walkthrough method produces valid data about usability of healthcare IT and benefits participating physicians by introducing them to principles of usability. Being able to utilise clinically working physicians in usability evaluation presents interesting new opportunities to engage physicians into developing better healthcare IT systems.