Exploring the role that visible factors play in diagnostic error
My offerings
Offered human-centered design input (with a focus on equity) to shape the process and activities of the project like the following:
questioning approaches
framing design challenges and opportunities
composing teams of participants
structuring the workshops
creating brainstorming activities
gathering feedback from participants
Visible Factors
Race, ethnicity, age, and gender
Background
The research team explored how cognitive reasoning pitfalls - mistakes in how someone thinks or comes to a conclusion – among physicians contribute to the risk of diagnostic errors for people from historically vulnerable populations. For example, a clinician may incorrectly rule out cancer in a patient because they are too young or make false assumptions about their symptoms because of their race or ethnicity.
Co-creation
An active patient and research advisory board including researchers, doctors, nurses, patients, and patient advocates discussed first-hand experiences of diagnostic errors. They participated in 4 workshops to discuss potential reasons for and solutions to end diagnostic disparities. By design, conversations among the project team were casual, open, and interactive despite the inability to meet in person during COVID-19.
Output
A set of ‘right evaluative questions’ along with many categories of solutions and solution prototypes were generated. Publications and dissemination plans aimed to attract both the scientific and patient community to explore and address diagnostic disparities.
Collaborator
Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine, Johns Hopkins School of Nursing, Public Health and Medicine
Diagnostic Disparities, Patient Safety
2020, Baltimore, USA
READ THE REPORT
to learn details about the design process and solutions generated!
In 2018, the Society to Improve Diagnosis in Medicine (SIDM) – in partnership with principal investigator Dr. Kathy McDonald (Johns Hopkins University Schools of Nursing and Medicine, previously at Stanford University) – was awarded a grant from the Coverys Community Healthcare Foundation to investigate solutions to improve the diagnostic process.
