Assessing the Risks and Success Factors of Telehealth Development Projects in an Academic Setting

Abstract

The development of a telehealth technology in an academic setting is a complex project that faces several obstacles. The early assessment of the project risks plays a critical role in the translation of promising telehealth innovations into healthcare practice. This paper presents a decision support tool based on Failure Mode and Effects Analysis (FMEA) and Quality Function Deployment (QFD) techniques to associate the project risks to relevant success factors. Certain modifications in both techniques are applied to deploy them for project risk assessment. The project risks and success factors used in the tool are identified from the literature. The proposed decision support tool enables researchers to manage the risks in their telehealth development projects and identify action items to overcome such risks. The application of the proposed tool is illustrated with a telehealth development project for virtual physical therapy.