How to Present Evidence-Based Usability Design Principles Dedicated to Medication-Related Alerting Systems to Designers and Evaluators? Results from a Workshop.

Medication alerting system use errors and lack of adoption are often attributed to usability issues. Previous work has used evidence from the literature to reveal usability principles specific to medication alerting systems and identify potential consequences of violating these principles. The current study sought to explore how best to convey these principles to designers and evaluators of these systems to facilitate their work. To this aim, a workshop with 19 participants was used to generate ideas and opinions on how to deliver these topic-specific design principles in a way that would be most helpful for them. Participants generated ideas for how (e.g., a collaborative, continuously updated forum) and what (e.g., illustrations, checklists, evidence sources and strength, consequences of violations) information is most useful to disseminate usability principles for medication alerting systems. Participants, especially designers, expressed desire to use these principles in practice and avoid previously documented mistakes and therefore make design and evaluation of these systems more effective and efficient. Those insights are discussed in terms of feasibility and logistical challenges to developing the proposed documentation). To move this work forward, a more collaborative approach of Human Factors specialists in medical informatics is necessary.