Exploring Contradictions in the Use of Mobile Technology by Multidisciplinary Healthcare Teams

Modern healthcare is predominantly delivered by a multidisciplinary health care team (MHCT). MHCTs in hospitals have shown to improve health outcomes through enhanced communication and improved patient satisfaction. Mobile technology is increasingly being used in healthcare to provide quality care to patients. Healthcare professionals are embracing mobile technologies, as evidenced by substantial research contributions. This study is extending recent research into the use of mobile technology by a MHCT using Activity Theory as a theoretical lens. The current research focusses on exploring the contradictions that emerge as a result of the use of mobile technologies by the MHCTs. Based on data collected from four cases, this study reveals some significant contradictions focusing on the tool dimension; more specifically, i) Personal device Vs. Professional device ii) Flexibility of the device Vs. Restricted access iii) Anywhere, anytime Vs. Drawing boundaries

Mobile Technology Use in a Multidisciplinary Healthcare Team - Factors and Challenges

Mobile technologies are being increasingly used in the health care sector to deliver quality care to patients through improved communication. While considerable research has been carried out in this area, there is limited research as to how mobile technology is being used by a multidisciplinary health care team (MHCT). This study aims to shed some light on the use of mobile technology by a MHCT. Using Activity Theory as a lens, we report on a qualitative study carried out in a large Australian hospital. This research identified the type of tasks and characteristics of the roles of the MHCT as important factors in understanding how they use mobile technology. The type of use for the technology was classified into spontaneous, restricted and potential use. Communication was found to be the key "spontaneous” use by the MHCT. The major challenges faced by the MHCT were privacy and security, and confidentiality

Mobile technology use in a multidisciplinary healthcare team - factors and challenges

Mobile technologies are being increasingly used in the health care sector to deliver quality care to patients through improved communication. While considerable research has been carried out in this area, there is limited research as to how mobile technology is being used by a multidisciplinary health care team (MHCT). This study aims to shed some light on the use of mobile technology by a MHCT. Using Activity Theory as a lens, we report on a qualitative study carried out in a large Australian hospital. This research identified the type of tasks and characteristics of the roles of the MHCT as important factors in understanding how they use mobile technology. The type of use for the technology was classified into spontaneous, restricted and potential use. Communication was found to be the key spontaneous” use by the MHCT. The major challenges faced by the MHCT were privacy and security, and confidentiality

Foresight Review on Design for Safety

This review explores how a culture of design for safety can enhance the safety of the world around us. Design for safety goes beyond legislation, regulations and standards. These all play an important role for established products and services but their limited scope often leads to missed opportunities to enhance safety by taking a broader perspective. Design is applied to both mature industries (which have many years of experience and a good understanding of risks and how to reduce them) and emerging industries (that use new technologies requiring new ways of controlling risk which may not yet be known or understood). An example of an emerging risk is the internet that is enabling rapid innovation of new products which generate data. This data is widely shared across the internet and the risks associated with this are as yet not fully understood by the public. A design for safety culture takes a holistic approach to understanding the influences that affect safety. Such influences are varied and take into account the broader environment within which design operates, including complex interactions, behaviour and culture. It goes beyond traditional design methods and focuses on the goal of a safer design. Implementing design for safety requires an understanding of the challenges and the methods to address them. It needs multidisciplinary teams that bring together people with the relevant skills to understand the challenges and a collaborative approach of ‘designing with’ rather than the more traditional approach of ‘designing for’. This can be achieved through an international diverse community that works together to identify and share best practices

Foresight Review on Design for Safety

This review explores how a culture of design for safety can enhance the safety of the world around us. Design for safety goes beyond legislation, regulations and standards. These all play an important role for established products and services but their limited scope often leads to missed opportunities to enhance safety by taking a broader perspective. Design is applied to both mature industries (which have many years of experience and a good understanding of risks and how to reduce them) and emerging industries (that use new technologies requiring new ways of controlling risk which may not yet be known or understood). An example of an emerging risk is the internet that is enabling rapid innovation of new products which generate data. This data is widely shared across the internet and the risks associated with this are as yet not fully understood by the public. A design for safety culture takes a holistic approach to understanding the influences that affect safety. Such influences are varied and take into account the broader environment within which design operates, including complex interactions, behaviour and culture. It goes beyond traditional design methods and focuses on the goal of a safer design. Implementing design for safety requires an understanding of the challenges and the methods to address them. It needs multidisciplinary teams that bring together people with the relevant skills to understand the challenges and a collaborative approach of ‘designing with’ rather than the more traditional approach of ‘designing for’. This can be achieved through an international diverse community that works together to identify and share best practices

Artificial Intelligence: Threat or ‘colleague’? Exploring managers’ perceptions of AI in organisations

COVID-19 has brought organizations to reinvent their businesses due to the greater need: employees and customers safety. This paper explores managers’ perceptions of the adoption of AI in the workplace. It considers how they construct new technology adoption and the potential it has to be integrated into work practices. This research in progress paper contributes to the information systems literature by taking a qualitative approach to better understand managers’ perspectives of AI and the contextual factors that influence their decision to adopt. Semi-structured interviews were used to study managers’ perceptions and experiences through which AI might have been considered supportive or a job threat. Overall, pre-liminary findings showed that managers have dealt with technologies that have helped them to perform their managerial duties. However, most of them have displayed doubts related to trust and interpersonal complexity. Interviews unanimously stated that AI cannot (completely) replace managers, but it is of interest how they also highlighted the uncertainty of AI and its future. Future research will further explore the complexities of AI adoption using Cultural-Historical Activity Theory as a framework to understand the transformation of organisational activities through socio-technological practices

Prototypes as identity markers: The double-edged role of prototypes in multidisciplinary innovation teams

Prototypes play a powerful role in facilitating the work of multidisciplinary innovation teams, but if not properly managed, they may inhibit innovation processes. This paper inquires into the tensions that exist around the use of prototypes in multidisciplinary teams. We studied the relationship between work identities (related to teams and subgroups within teams) and prototypes with a field study of a multidisciplinary team in an emergency department, in charge of redesigning the layout of the unit. Results show that different values of subgroup identities are reflected in the solutions devised by the team. These values become salient through the prototype; that is, the prototype is an identity marker, especially when it is characterized by higher tangibility, fidelity and validity. When the prototype is an identity marker, it sparks conflict within the team. We also find that a superordinate team identity can help in solving conflictual interactions. Our analysis contributes to revealing how prototypes as identity markers can both inhibit and facilitate the innovation process of multidisciplinary teams. We offer theoretical and practical implications for managers, team members and designers working in multidisciplinary teams

How Feature- and Communication Constraints in CSS Affect Creative Collaboration in Virtual Teams - An Activity Theory Perspective

New Creativity Support Systems (CSS) provide additional features, but are also growing more complex and difficult to operate. Via new functionalities, CSS aim to facilitate virtual creative collaboration and enable better outcomes. However, research shows that, especially in the context of creativity, better outcomes are not always the result of more options and features. Our study applies activity theory (AT) as a lens in order to examine how constraints can be applied to creative collaboration in virtual teams. This study advances research on collaboration in information systems (IS) as well as human-centered development of IT-artifacts that facilitate creative collaboration. Our findings provide two practical takeaways for CSS developers and virtual teams: First, constraints in CSS can be designed to substantially benefit idea generation and exploration beyond routine performance; second, constraints can be designed to help teams access the potential of CSS faster and more efficiently

Acting in Time: Transport Nurses optimising critically ill patients for transfer to a regional ECMO centre. A Grounded Theory Study

Regionalisation and centralisation of Intensive Care Units, coupled with demographic changes, have resulted in an increased demand for inter-hospital transport. The Conventional ventilatory support vs Extracorporeal membrane oxygenation for Severe Adult Respiratory Failure Trial (CESAR), validated the use of ECMO in the UK for critically ill adults. The H1N1 Influenza A epidemic in 2009, led to four more adult ECMO centres being designated, and more recently the World Health Organisation (WHO, 2020), recommended ECMO for eligible patients in the COVID-19 pandemic. A critical incident occurred while I was undertaking the transport of a critically ill adult, which led to the unplanned use of mobile ECMO, still in its infancy. Seeking answers to the questions raised from this incident a research proposal was formed in order to investigate what could be learnt from the actions of transport nurses in promoting stability and preventing deterioration of patient acuity during the transport process. A grounded theory approach was used to try and understand the processes and strategies that experienced transport nurses used in optimising their patients’ stability and generate a substantive theory in explaining their timely actions. Under a pragmatic paradigm, this grounded theory study utilised the methods of Retrospective Medical Records Review and Interviews. Quantitative random sampling of 50 patients retrieved to a regional ECMO centre, allowed the collection of vital physiological variables staged over three time points. Data analysis showed that two out of the eight variables demonstrated a statistical significance in deterioration. Qualitative unstructured interviews from six transport nurses revealed a variety of activities, proactive and reactive, cognitive and physical, with overwhelming attention to time constraints, employed to benefit the patient. An explanatory theory was identified. Acting in Time encapsulated extant theory from the Secure Base Model (SBM) in fostering studies, and the Actor-Network Theory (ANT), from sociological literature. Acting in Time made overt the core virtues, practices, and skills of the transport nurse in aiming to reduce the risks associated will transport of the critically ill adult while striving to maintain patient stability. The study identified a growing need for centralisation, coordination, standardisation, audit, education and training for all those involved in transporting critically ill patients to a regional ECMO centre. It recommends that dedicated regional transport centres should be implemented for the transport of the adult critical care patient. A centralised database should be created for the import of data from the regional transport teams. Education for all nurses, not just transport nurses, needs to be available to deliver high quality care at any point of patient retrieval. A curriculum for transport education for nurses is outlined. This research reinforces and adds to the Intensive Care Society and Faculty of Intensive Care Medicine (ICS & FICM, 2019), and standards of education for nurses enhanced

Implementing artificial intelligence in traditional B2B marketing practices: an Activity Theory perspective

Anecdotal evidence suggests that artificial intelligence (AI) technologies are highly effective in digital marketing and rapidly growing in popularity in the context of business-to-business (B2B) marketing. Yet empirical research on AI-powered B2B marketing, and particularly on the socio-technical aspects of its use, is sparse. This study uses Activity Theory (AT) as a theoretical lens to examine AI-powered B2B marketing as a collective activity system, and to illuminate the contradictions that emerge when adopting and implementing AI into traditional B2B marketing practices. AT is appropriate in the context of this study, as it shows how contradictions act as a motor for change and lead to transformational changes, rather than viewing tensions as a threat to prematurely abandon the adoption and implementation of AI in B2B marketing. Based on eighteen interviews with industry and academic experts, the study identifies contradictions with which marketing researchers and practitioners must contend. We show that these contradictions can be culturally or politically challenging to confront, and even when resolved, can have both intended and unintended consequences