Developing a Comprehensive Model of Intensive Care Unit Processes: Concept of Operations

Area of Science:

• Systems engineering applied to healthcare.
• Patient safety and quality improvement initiatives.
• Intensive care unit (ICU) operational efficiency.

Background:

• Intensive care units face challenges in reducing patient harm.
• Existing healthcare systems may have fragmented processes leading to inefficiencies.
• A structured approach is needed to analyze and improve complex care delivery.

Purpose of the Study:

• To apply a systems engineering approach to enhance ICU performance.
• To improve stakeholder engagement for patient safety.
• To develop a framework for reducing various types of patient harm.

Main Methods:

• Developed a conceptual framework or concept of operations (ConOps).
• Analyzed patient harm through risk assessment, therapies, monitoring, and communication.
• Used a transdisciplinary approach to inventory tasks and workflows for harm elimination.
• Created detailed workflow models, exemplified by deep venous thrombosis prevention.

Main Results:

• Identified synergistic tasks across different types of patient harm.
• Developed a detailed specification for clinicians based on system analysis.
• Demonstrated potential for improved efficiency through task duplication reduction.
• Proposed a system of systems approach for process integration.

Conclusions:

• Understanding healthcare processes and workflows is crucial for reliability.
• The ConOps strategy provides a framework for building complex systems to reduce patient harm.
• This approach can be applied across various patient harms and care settings.