Health & Patient Safety Research Lab
Collaboration is at the heart of multi-disciplinary practice and essential in tackling the complex challenges of design for health and patient safety.
An initial research collaboration with the Engineering Design Centre at the University of Cambridge and the Robens Centre for Health Ergonomics at the University of Surrey, delivered the DoH report on Design for Patient Safety (DPS) commissioned through the Design Council.
This led to the establishment of the MRC/EPSRC/ESRC-funded Design for Patient Safety Network, and to collaborations with the Healthcare Ergonomics and Patient Safety Research Unit at Loughborough University on ambulance design, and with the Department of Biosurgery and Surgical Technology, the Clinical Safety Research Unit and the NIHR Research Centre for Patient Safety and Service Quality at Imperial College and St Mary’s Hospital Paddington on medical equipment design.
That collaboration is being extended to include the Imperial College Business School in order to undertake a wider proposed study into the design of non-surgical equipment in use on hospital wards.
Work on ambulance design is being extended as an investigation into new delivery models for urgent and emergency care, in collaboration with the Department of Human Sciences at Loughborough University; the School of Management Studies at the University of Bath; the Faculty of Health and Social Care at the University of West of England; and the School of Law and Social Sciences at the University of Plymouth.
Practical research collaborations have been undertaken as part of the Helen Hamlyn Research Associates Programme. This partners recent RCA graduates with industry, the NHS and voluntary sector partners. GlaxoSmithKline, DePuy, Celesio, the British Heart Foundation, the Guide Dogs for the Blind Association, the NHS National Patient Safety Agency, Orange and Pearson Matthews have been involved. These partnerships have been match funded through a dedicated endowment from the Helen Hamlyn Trust, which has also supported student competitions to nurture an interest in patient safety amongst young designers at the RCA and other design institutions.
Project and research funding bodies include the EPSRC (with MRC and ESRC for the DPS network), NHS National Patient Safety Agency, Audi Design Foundation and Laura Ashley Foundation. The HEFCE Higher Education Innovation Fund has supported collaborative work with Imperial College leading to new surgical instruments and work on ambulance design and a new resuscitation trolley have been co-funded by the Helen Hamlyn Trust and the NHS National Patient Safety Agency.
