Development and Evaluation of a Tablet-Control for a Surgical Workstation in the Open Integrated Operating Room.

In the complex and safety-critical environment of the operating room the increasing use of technology and the interactions are significant causes for critical incidents and adverse events. Thus, the usability needs to be optimized, e.g. by enhancing the Human-Machine-Interaction, the workflow and therefore the safety for users and patients. Hence, big companies offer integrated operation room systems, with harmonized safety- and HMI-concepts. Unfortunately, these systems come along with closed proprietary communication solutions. This prevents flexible design for the hospital operator and easy integration of medical equipment from small and medium-sized enterprises. To open this market, a safe and dynamic networking approach of medical devices has been established on the basis of an open communication standard (IEEE 11073-SDC). Within the OR.NET follow-up project ZiMT (Certifiable integrated Medical Technology), a mobile control in addition to the central surgical workstation use concept has been developed. The requirement analysis for the tablet concept considers existing integrated OR systems and the development and evaluation of human-machine interfaces, regarding the usability engineering process as well as related standards (e.g. Machinery Directive 2006/42/EC, DIN EN ISO 9241-110, IEC 62366). The graphical user interface provides inter alia a flexible und workflow-oriented assembly of a function group view. To evaluate the developed concept in comparison to the user interface of the workstation, an interaction-centered usability test with nine participants (surgeons and OR nurses) has been conducted. The results show a comparable effectiveness and efficiency. Moreover, the intuitiveness of the tablet control is estimated to be higher and most test subjects prefer to work with the tablet control.