Interdisciplinary communication in the intensive care unit

Background. Patient safety research has shown poor communication among intensive care unit (ICU) nurses and doctors to be a common causal factor underlying critical incidents in intensive care. This study examines whether ICU doctors and nurses have a shared perception of interdisciplinary communication in the UK ICU. Methods. Cross-sectional survey of ICU nurses and doctors in four UK hospitals using a previously established measure of ICU interdisciplinary collaboration. Results. A sample of 48 doctors and 136 nurses (47% response rate) from four ICUs responded to the survey. Nurses and doctors were found to have differing perceptions of interdisciplinary communication, with nurses reporting lower levels of communication openness between nurses and doctors. Compared with senior doctors, trainee doctors also reported lower levels of communication openness between doctors. A regression path analysis revealed that communication openness among ICU team members predicted the degree to which individuals reported understanding their patient care goals (adjR2 = 0.17). It also showed that perceptions of the quality of unit leadership predicted open communication. Conclusions. Members of ICU teams have divergent perceptions of their communication with one another. Communication openness among team members is also associated with the degree to which they understand patient care goals. It is necessary to create an atmosphere where team members feel they can communicate openly without fear of reprisal or embarrassment

Innovative collaborative design in international interaction design summer schools

[About the book]: Design is changing, and to educate the next generation of designers, these changes need to be addressed. In light of the growing role research and interdisciplinary collaboration play in contemporary design performance, Design Integrations calls for an innovative shake up in design education. Poggenpohl asserts that design research is developed through a typology within academic and business contexts, and follows different research theories and strategies. Such issues in design collaboration are explored in-depth, with essays on an inter-institutional academic project, cross-cultural learning experiences, and a multi-national healthcare project, demonstrating the importance of shared values, interdisciplinary negotiated process and clear communication for tomorrow’s designers

Is technology enhanced learning an interdisciplinary activity?

This paper describes an approach to working in educational technology informed by the recognition of the subject as a major current site for interdisciplinary activity. Currently the most popular term for educational technology embraced in the UK and in the EU is Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL). We draw on the literature on interdisciplinary and multi-disciplinary working, contemporary rationales for interdisciplinarity as an imperative for meeting the challenges of knotty real world problems, and the experience of working in interdisciplinary teams in TEL. The purpose is to establish the particular features of this collaborative research effort. This perspective from literature and contemporary rhetoric around practice is supplemented with reference to several interview studies of TEL project teams. These studies outlined the advantages in terms of growth, multiple perspectives and design methodologies but also the challenges in terms of sustainability, career progression and publication, the benefits of technologies for communication within teams and distinctive working practices (Jordan et al. 2012, Conole et al., 2010, Scanlon et al, 2013)

"Involving Interface": An Extended Mind Theoretical Approach to Roboethics

In 2008 the authors held Involving Interface, a lively interdisciplinary event focusing on issues of biological, sociocultural, and technological interfacing (see Acknowledgments). Inspired by discussions at this event, in this article, we further discuss the value of input from neuroscience for developing robots and machine interfaces, and the value of philosophy, the humanities, and the arts for identifying persistent links between human interfacing and broader ethical concerns. The importance of ongoing interdisciplinary debate and public communication on scientific and technical advances is also highlighted. Throughout, the authors explore the implications of the extended mind hypothesis for notions of moral accountability and robotics

Clinical Observation Reflections from Students in an Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Course

The purpose of this study was to gain insight into how a brief clinical observation encounter contributed to students’ experiences in an interdisciplinary palliative care course. This course was required of all graduate nursing students and was available as an elective for medical and other healthcare professions students at a healthcare sciences university. The students were required to spend approximately 8 to 12 hours attending interdisciplinary team meetings or accompanying a team on rounds and patient visits. The students’ summary narratives of their observation experience were analyzed in this qualitative study that focused on six categories of feedback: (1) patients’ and families’ reactions, (2) communication issues with patients and families, (3) how the palliative care team speaks with the patient and family, (4) communication within the interdisciplinary team, (5) students’ reflections, and (6) students’ suffering. This study demonstrated that a clinical observation activity can be a valuable introduction to palliative care principles for healthcare students in an interdisciplinary course. Students benefited from gaining insight into family/practitioner communications regarding difficult issues, interdisciplinary roles and cooperation, and application of palliative care principles to clinical practice. Further research is required to identify appropriate interventions to deal with student distress resulting from such early career clinical encounters

Book review: Taking our country back: the crafting ofnetworked politics from Howard Dean to Barack Obama

Through a detailed history of new media and political campaigning, Taking Our Country Back contributes to an interdisciplinary body of scholarship from communication, sociology, and political science. The book theorizes processes of innovation in online electoral politics and aims to give readers a new understanding of how the internet and its use by the Howard Dean campaign have fundamentally changed the field of political campaigning. Reviewed by Paul Brighton

Interdisciplinary communication for environmental effectiveness: Forward-looking lessons from leadership, followership and strategic entrepreneurship

This article contends that interdisciplinary interactions, and temporal factors, influence communications between environment and organisations in ways that are understudied. It tracks the evolution of one recent interface between strategy and entrepreneurship to illustrate the process in action and to suggest how that hybrid can, in turn, interface with new leadership research to improve organisational responses at a time of fast-moving change. In addition, it makes a case for integrating action learning, action research, and action inquiry, as a method for generating more relevant and forward-looking case material than retrospective studies of past practice

First Looks: CATaC '98\ud

The First International Conference on Cultural Attitudes Towards Technology and Communication (CATaC’98), and its affiliated publications, seek to bring together current insights from philosophy, communication theory, and cultural sciences in an interdisciplinary dialogue. The synthesis of disparate scholarly ideas will shed greater light on just how culture impacts on the use and appropriation of new communications technologies. Beyond the individual contributions themselves, some of our most significant insights will emerge as we listen and discuss carefully with one another during the conference itself. As a way of preparing for that discussion, I offer the following overview of the CATaC papers and abstracts, along with a summary of the insights and questions they suggest

Multicriteria assessment and communication of effects of organic food systems

This project will provide analyses, methods and prototypes of multicriteria assessment, to help organic actors and stakeholders develop, document and communicate balanced overall assessments of the effects of organic food systems on society and nature. The project will carry out interdisciplinary analyses of existing methods for multicriteria assessment and communication; establish a framework for how to develop such methods for organic food systems and relate them to the organic principles; and test prototypes in practice. This shall help sustain an integrated development of the organic production, contribute to open and credible communication about the benefits of organics, and thereby support long term growth

Quantum information with continuous variables

Quantum information is a rapidly advancing area of interdisciplinary research. It may lead to real-world applications for communication and computation unavailable without the exploitation of quantum properties such as nonorthogonality or entanglement. We review the progress in quantum information based on continuous quantum variables, with emphasis on quantum optical implementations in terms of the quadrature amplitudes of the electromagnetic field.Comment: accepted for publication in Reviews of Modern Physic