PROJECTS

Recovery and Renewal in HealthCare

This project aims to build capacity and resilience in co-design in health. The project will explore how co-design practices evolved to engage the most impacted communities in health service research, delivery, and improvement during and beyond a pandemic. This will be achieved through a research study and a parallel community of practice.

We aim to support the community with guidance and tools to rapidly advance the field of co-design in health, specifically addressing issues of equity, diversity, and inclusion, with new guidance on techniques that can endure beyond the pandemic. The Co-design CoP aims to foster knowledge/experience exchange, collaboration, learning, capacity building, and resource/knowledge mobilization. ‘Recovery and Renewal of Participation in Healthcare Change’ project invites design researchers, health researchers and community partners to join our Community of Practice (CoP) that focuses on building resilience and capacity in co-design in health.

This project is a collaboration between the Health Design Studio at OCAD University, the Design Health Research Innovation Lab at University of Alberta, Health Design Lab at Emily Carr University, SE Research Center at Saint Elizabeth Health, Lab4Living at Sheffield Hallam University, and CoLab for Community and Behavioral Health Policy at the University of Washington. This project is supported by the National Frontiers in Research Fund program of Canada.

To join the Community of Practice, click here: co-design-beyond-pandemics.mn.co/feed

collaborators:

Lariena Kumar - Caylee Raber - Kate Sellen - Maryam Mallakin - Paul Holyoke - Shraddha Kumbhar - Nadia Beyzaei  

Gillian Harvey - Joe Langley - Sarah Walker - Mehrnoush Zeidebadi

Naloxone Kit Instructions Design

Gillian Harvey with co-investigator Dr. Stephanie VandenBerg (Emergency Physician, AHS) were recently honoured by the Universal Design Competition as part of the Munich Creative Business Week. In collaboration with the Harm Reduction Team at Alberta Health Services, led by Sara, their project Emergency Overdose Kit for the Province of Alberta received two international awards: UNIVERSAL DESIGN expert 2021, and UNIVERSAL DESIGN consumer 2021. You can read more about this project at the International Institute for Information Design (IIID) site, where it also won a 2020 IIID Silver Award.

Naloxone kits contain 3 vials of naloxone, branded as Narcan; three injectable needles; gloves; masks and a face shield, as well as instructions on how to administer naloxone.

The wide distribution of drug overdose prevention kits in Alberta means that overdose kits may be used by users with little to no experience or previous medical training. Often kit training is given by a medical professional, however, it is possible that training may be refused or forgotten at the time of use. As a result, people are often left to rely solely on the instructions and information included in the kit pre and post emergency. Some users encounter the instructions for the first time in the midst of an emergency when they need to urgently give an injection to someone who has lost consciousness. 

Redesigned and tested instructions are now included in every overdose kit that are free to every Albertan. There are over 2,000 sites in Alberta, where anyone can pick up a kit free of charge. A ‘Skyrocketing number of reversals’ has been reported indicating that overdose kits are working: According to the Opioid Response Surveillance Report, from Jan. 1, 2016 to Sept. 30, 2019, 195,460 naloxone kits were dispensed in the province through Alberta Health Services’ naloxone program, and 12,830 overdose reversals were reported.

This pilot project has led to a national pilot project called Saving Lives: The development and evaluation of a universal information design response for opioid poisonings and has been awarded the Social Science & Humanities Research Council (SSCHR) IDG grant (starting September 2021).

For more information about this project contact, gillian harvey, at gharvey@ualberta.ca

Read about the project research here: Harvey G., Bubric K. 2020. “Information Design to Save Lives: Visualizing Data in the Design of Overdose Kits”. In: Stephanidis C., Marcus A., Rosenzweig E., Rau PL.P., Moallem A., Rauterberg M. (eds) HCI International 2020 - Late Breaking Papers: User Experience Design and Case Studies. HCII 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 12423. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-60114-0_28

WHY Supervised Consumption Services (SCS)?

Identity, Infographics and Website

Canada is experiencing a drug overdose epidemic which has killed over 21,000 people between 2016 and 2020. In July 2020, it was found that a Canadian died every 29 minutes from drug poisoning in one week. Supervised Consumption Sites (SCS) are an essential component of Canada’s overdose response. Partnering with ICHWP, this project translates evidence about the impacts on health outcomes, cost savings, crime and public order, and what a typical visit at a Supervised Consumption site looks like. As part of this project, we developed a website with evidence briefs and infographics providing insights for policy as well as information about CSC and the myths and facts about SCS for lay audiences. 

Website: whyscs.ca

Addictions Don’t Discriminate Co-design workshops + exhibition

The Addictions Don’t Discriminate Project is an in-person interactive exhibit in Edmonton, Alberta, that takes participants on the journeys of real people whose lives have been impacted by addiction. Objectives of this project are to increase empathy, communication and access to information related to addictions and mental health research as well as decreasing the stigma of substance use disorders. 

You can read more about it here: https://edmontonjournal.com/news/local-news/addictions-dont-discriminate-exhibit-on-display-at-stanley-a-milner-library.

Project website: https://addictionsdontdiscriminate.com/

This project received a recommendation award from IIIDaward (International Institute for Information Design)

in May 2023.

Patient Experience (Alberta Health Services) 

Hospital emergency rooms can be confusing, stressful places. The purpose of the Patient Experience Project is to help patients navigate and understand the complexities of a hospital emergency room.  Our analysis of patient experience surveys conducted by the Health Quality Council of Alberta (HQCA) showed that staff care and communication had the highest impact on patient experience in the emergency department (Health Quality Council Alberta, 2014). “Good patient experience also has a well-documented, positive relationship to other aspects of healthcare quality, including patients’ engagement with and adherence to providers’ instructions, and clinical processes and outcomes” (Browne et al. 2010, 921). In this project, a patient experience map was designed and tailored to different health authorities. This tool was implemented in 130 emergency rooms in Alberta and 60 in British Columbia. For more information about this project, contact Gillian Harvey, at gharvey@ualberta.ca

Read about the project research here: Harvey G., Bubric K., VandenBerg S., & Hair H. (2021). “Understanding patient experience in the emergency room using multiple methods.” Design for Health 5(2), 233-251, DOI: 10.1080/24735132.2021.1989133

Grey Nuns Emergency Room Signage / Wayfinding

This project aimed to develop, design and test a pilot signage and wayfinding system in the Grey Nuns Hospital in Edmonton, Alberta. We employed design methodologies to evaluate the existing wayfinding system, which consisted primarily of signage and posted maps in a small (45-bed/recliner) Emergency Department in Edmonton. Despite existing research evidence on appropriate signage design and other effective wayfinding strategies, hospital wayfinding systems are often not intuitive. Furthermore, patients and families are often not involved in the research, design, evaluation or the implementation of these systems. Working with patient/family representatives in the evaluation of these systems can identify improvement opportunities that may not be otherwise recognized during the design phase. This project provided a structured methodology for evaluating proposed wayfinding systems prior to implementation in order to optimize their effectiveness and improve the patient/visitor experience in the hospital setting. For more information about this project contact, gillian harvey, at gharvey@ualberta.ca

Read about the project research here: Bubric, K, Harvey, G. and Pitamber, T. (2020). A User-Centered Approach to Evaluating Wayfinding Systems in Healthcare. Health Environments Research & Design Journal 01(12),1-12. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/19375 86720959074

See more work in our Archived Projects

Suboxone Patient Materials for BC Interior Health

DHRIL worked with BC Interior Health to provide accessibility to suboxone in the form of Suboxone Patient Information Materials, a Quick Guide to Suboxone for Practitioners and Posters for Emergency Rooms.

"Given the increasing number of toxic drug deaths across B.C. – deaths that reached a tragic 2,224 in 2021 – Interior Health’s Emergency Services and Mental Health and Substance Use networks partnered in June 2021 on a strategy to introduce a standardized approach for connecting people with opioid use disorder to Suboxone in emergency departments.

Working with BC Interior Health, we designed a set of pictograms for the signs and symptoms of withdrawl, and information for patients on how to use suboxone which can be confusing. More information can be found here:

https://www.interiorhealth.ca/stories/emergency-departments-connecting-more-people-opioid-treatment

Miscarriage Corner

an app designed to improve the accessibility and usability for immigrant women after a miscarriage

This project presents the potential for technology—through an mHeath application—in providing physical and emotional support for immigrant women who have experienced a miscarriage.

A series of user-centred design approaches (including storyboards, user personas, co-design session and user testing) were employed to ensure the end-user is involved in the process of designing the application. A participatory approach was chosen to bring healthcare professionals in different fields with a vested interest in miscarriage together to design a digital solution for immigrant women.

Designer: Mehrnoush Zeidebadi, for fulfillment of MDes thesis at University of Alberta

This project received a recommendation award from IIIDaward (International Institute for Information Design)

in May 2023.

 PUBLICATIONS

Harvey G., Bubric K., VandenBerg S., & Hair H. (2021). “Understanding patient experience in the emergency room using multiple methods.” Design for Health 5 (2), 233-251, DOI: 10.1080/24735132.2021.1989133

Harvey G, Knox M, Hyshka E, Rowe A, Lefsrud L, Sommerfeldt S, Forhan M. (2021) “Opioid overdose response and health information complexities: A pilot study on Naloxone kit design.” The Journal of Health Design 6 (2), 391–400. https://doi.org/10.21853/JHD.2021.135

Bubric, K, Harvey, G. and Pitamber, T. (2020). A User-Centered Approach to Evaluating Wayfinding Systems in Healthcare. Health Environments Research & Design Journal 01 (12),1-12. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/19375 86720959074

Rowe, A., Knox M., and Harvey, G. (2020). “Re-Thinking Health through Design: Collaborations in Research, Education and Practice.” Design for Health 4 (3), 1–18. https://doi.org/10.1080/24735132.2020.1841918.

Harvey G., Bubric K. (2020). “Information Design to Save Lives: Visualizing Data in the Design of Overdose Kits”. In: Stephanidis C., Marcus A., Rosenzweig E., Rau PL.P., Moallem A., Rauterberg M. (eds) HCI International 2020 - Late Breaking Papers: User Experience Design and Case Studies. HCII 2020. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 12423. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-60114-0_28

 PRESENTATIONS

Coming Soon!