BACKGROUND: Use of wearable sensor technology for studying human teamwork behavior is expected to generate a better understanding of the inter-professional interactions between healthcare professionals. OBJECTIVE: We used wearable sociometric sensor badges to study how ICU healthcare professionals interact and are socially connected. METHODS: We studied the face-to-face interaction data among 76 healthcare professionals in the ICU at Mie University Hospital collected over 4 weeks via wearable sensors. RESULTS: We detail the spatiotemporal distributions of staff inter- and intra-professional active face-to-face interactions, thereby generating a comprehensive visualization of who met whom, when, where and for how long in the ICU. Social network analysis of these active interactions, concomitant with centrality measurements, revealed that nurses constitute the core members of the network, while doctors remain in the periphery. CONCLUSIONS: Our social network analysis using the comprehensive ICU interaction data obtained by wearable sensors has revealed the leading roles played by nurses within the professional communication network.
BACKGROUND: Use of wearable sensor technology for studying human teamwork behavior is expected to generate a better understanding of the inter-professional interactions between healthcare professionals. OBJECTIVE: We used wearable sociometric sensor badges to study how ICU healthcare professionals interact and are socially connected. METHODS: We studied the face-to-face interaction data among 76 healthcare professionals in the ICU at Mie University Hospital collected over 4 weeks via wearable sensors. RESULTS: We detail the spatiotemporal distributions of staff inter- and intra-professional active face-to-face interactions, thereby generating a comprehensive visualization of who met whom, when, where and for how long in the ICU. Social network analysis of these active interactions, concomitant with centrality measurements, revealed that nurses constitute the core members of the network, while doctors remain in the periphery. CONCLUSIONS: Our social network analysis using the comprehensive ICU interaction data obtained by wearable sensors has revealed the leading roles played by nurses within the professional communication network.