Design Phase: A N E V I D E N C E- BA S E D D E S I G N A P P R OAC H T O C O O R D I N AT I O N I N S U R G I C A L S U I T E S Scheduling surgeries is challenging because of frequent urgent schedule changes to accommodate emergencies, transplants, and delays, affecting task coordination, resources, and people within and across staff groups. In surgical suites, the control desk and surgical schedule board become coordination centers, when staff with coordination roles answer questions, resolve conflicts, and keep the surgery schedule up to date there. Fieldwork in surgical suites and a national survey of surgical suite directors determined that the architecture of the physical space, information availability, and practices influence information sharing and coordination outcomes. Visual access between the shared surgery schedule display and the control desk influenced whether staff groups congregated around schedule boards. Traffic-free areas around the surgery schedule display and up-to-date surgery schedule display information were associated with lower coordination stress. An evidence-based design approach to the design of a surgical suite coordination location requires that research evidence inform design decisions, design hypotheses be linked to design outcomes, that the design be evaluated once it is built, and that the results of the design evaluation be published. 5 Figure 1. An existing surgical suite control desk and schedule board. Schedule board Control desk Figure 2. Three dimensional sketch of an existing schedule board and control desk. (right) Floor plan of same. Schedule board Control desk This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. IIS-0325047. Courtesy of Peter Scupelli. Figure 3. Three dimensional sketch of new control desk and schedule board. New floor plan of same. Black circles are control desk workers: white circles are information seekers. 1. Schedule board 2. Schedule board 3. Schedule board 4. Schedule board Control desk Control desk Control desk Control desk footpaths 1. Put information locations in connected areas. co-visible and co-audible areas 2. Make information locations mutually visible. information access areas 3. Limit traffic interference with information access. staff only area 4. Create staff only areas to protect information privacy. Figure 4. Increased coordination behavior and decreased coordination stress was associated with four design principles. See also 11. Case Studies · 53. Literature Reviews · 74. Secondary Research 77