Medical Device Usability Analyses

Abstract

Errors committed during healthcare providers’ use of patient controlled analgesia (PCA) systems in the acute care setting are poorly understood. A PCA is a complex, medical device that delivers a prescribed pain medication primarily through the intravenous route into the patient. The benefits of PCA use are numerous, but PCAs are also a known source of errors resulting in patient injury. Human factors usability analyses are methods to identify and mitigate factors that contribute to errors during user-device interaction. The purpose of this paper is to present the findings from an integrative review of published medical device usability analyses and to provide the foundation for future empirical research to improve our understanding of PCA system errors.