1,721,012 research outputs found
Design Perspectives for the New Normal in the Healthcare System
No full textThis paper aims to investigate the current role of design in healthcare and reflect on its mandate in defining products, services, strategies, and policies, proposing perspectives toward a person-centred healthcare. Today, design research in healthcare reflects on scenarios and challenges affecting innovation and change, considering the potentially disruptive effect of technological innovation on personal care and social, economic, ethical, and political aspects. Through a literature review and case studies analysis, the paper focuses on the current criticalities of the healthcare system, exacerbated by the pandemic situation, and presents a first taxonomy of the trajectories for design-led intervention. It reflects on top-down actions proposed by the government, activities of co-design and the cross-fertilisation between design and other disciplines, and bottom-up actions of social innovation, to present near future perspectives for design-led actions in healthcare
MIXED TEACHING APPROACHES IN EMBODIED INTERACTION DESIGN CLASS
No full textThe paper describes the teaching and learning experience in a design studio dealing with Tangible and Embodied Interaction, a stance introduced by Paul Dourish to overcome the emergent physical-digital divide, since computers are shrinking and becoming ubiquitous in our everyday life. Technology enables objects to be autonomous in interacting with other objects and with people. Designers should be able to conceive new forms of interaction - mixing visual, physical, haptic, and auditory channels - comprehensible for humans and non-humans, allowing them to interact in different contexts. The course uses a mixed teaching approach, considering methods such as ex-cathedra lectures, workshops, flipped classrooms, project-based learning, practical activities, and peer-to-peer revision and discussion
Dealing with Medicines Through Online Platforms and Communities
No full textThis chapter focuses on the link between social media and human health and well-being, with a peculiar interest in the communication of medicine, understood both as an object for treatment and as a commercial product. After an overview of social media and the extent to which they have changed access to the web, the way we create and disseminate content—personal or professional—and communicate with other people, the chapter analyses their contribution and use in medicine. Through observation of the trends on several social media, such as forums, blogs, and social networks, the chapter presents an analysis of the role of medicine in such environment, starting with the norms that regulate their communication and ending with the identification of platforms, channels, actors involved, modes of interaction, and registers of dialogue. Finally, the chapter proposes some reflections on how design culture can intervene in the relationship between medicines and social media, from the definition of guidelines for communication to research for improving the user experience of medicines
Learning from the patients
No full textThis paper addresses the patient’s learning pathways, struggling with a medication treatment process at home; here, as a non-expert, the patient must manage the care procedures, practices, and objects.
Starting from some empirical didactic experiences concerning the elderly’s therapies in daily lives, we focus on the gap between codified care models, as developed by pharma industries or incorporated in drugs, in their packaging, in the leaflets, in technological devices, and real users’ lifestyles. Evidence and examples documented through photos, interviews and questionnaires show how care information is interpreted, translated, and integrated by users who then apply it to medication (e.g., by changing the shape of the packaging or the drug itself or by adding short handwritten notes on the packaging) or care spaces. Here we highlight how design education based on observing natural user behaviour - not stereotyping the user - can open-up unexpected design trajectories in pharma, a domain in which companies pay little attention to daily therapeutic practices, habits, and complexity
An innovative bike for children play and rehabilitation
No full textDesign is strategic for rehabilitation engaging and social inclusion. According to this vision, we developed a bike to promote physical and ludic activities among children, with great care of the needs of children with Cerebral Palsy. Regular physical activity, such as cycling, improves their health condition, and specifically strength and cardiorespiratory performances. A bike adds to the benefits of physical activity, the opportunity to perform outdoors rehabilitation and to socialize with other children. The methodology started with a deep analysis consisting in several steps: literature and patents research, direct observations, questionnaires and interviews of all involved users (children, parents, clinicians). A new bike was designed and developed and some tests were performed. These tests were addressed to children (with or without CP), to their parents and physiotherapists, in order to understand if the new bike was useful, safe and desirable
Moving the care process in the in-home context: the therapeutic prescription
No full textAfter a medical consultation or hospitalisation, when the patient returns to everyday life, how is the correct adherence and therapeutic continuity guaranteed according to the indications given by the clinician, especially when it comes to multidimensional therapy (e.g. pharmacological, rehabilitation, etc.)? Do clinicians and hospitals use communication strategies and tools to give indications—through prescriptions—of sometimes complex therapies to be followed effectively? Moreover, what tools does the patient have to tell the general practitioner about the therapies in use or support therapy management at home? In the specific case of medicines, what dialogue is established between doctor and patient to assess the appropriateness of their prescription, considering not only clinical needs but also the patient’s lifestyle and preferences? The chapter addresses the process of transitioning care from the hospital to the home setting, presenting the different phases and issues that, on the medical side and the patient side, are experienced from the moment of prescription. The emerging reflections form the basis for formulating perspectives for future models of transition of care and discharge
Defining Requirements and Related Methods for Designing Sensorized Garments
Full text linkDesigning smart garments has strong interdisciplinary implications, specifically related to user and technical requirements, but also because of the very different applications they have: medicine, sport and fitness, lifestyle monitoring, workplace and job conditions analysis, etc. This paper aims to discuss some user, textile, and technical issues to be faced in sensorized clothes development. In relation to the user, the main requirements are anthropometric, gender-related, and aesthetical. In terms of these requirements, the user’s age, the target application, and fashion trends cannot be ignored, because they determine the compliance with the wearable system. Regarding textile requirements, functional factors—also influencing user comfort—are elasticity and washability, while more technical properties are the stability of the chemical agents’ effects for preserving the sensors’ efficacy and reliability, and assuring the proper duration of the product for the complete life cycle. From the technical side, the physiological issues are the most important: skin conductance, tolerance, irritation, and the effect of sweat and perspiration are key factors for reliable sensing. Other technical features such as battery size and duration, and the form factor of the sensor collector, should be considered, as they affect aesthetical requirements, which have proven to be crucial, as well as comfort and wearability
Wearable Ergonomics: Novel Integrated Solutions, Applications and Open Challenges
No full textAt present, the availability of wearable systems provides the capability of a quantitative, reliable and objective measurement of workers’ activities in ecological settings, thus without affecting the normal execution of the required tasks. The actual solutions offer the chance to integrate existing approaches used in the assessment of the work-related musculoskeletal disorders (WRMSD) within a multi-parametric framework, which should be properly exploited, even considering the inclusion of international standards. This present perspective also means developing new methodologies to collect and analyze big datasets, to be adopted for the evaluation of the physiological parameters, physical factors and the interaction within the environment. In this light, we dealt with the design and development of an integrated framework for the analysis of WRMSD and related risk exposure addressing complex working activities. A new set of technologies and novel methodological approaches were faced in the different scenarios, including large scale retail distribution, health, and industrial applications. This chapter aims at providing a short overview of the current situation and designing perspectives in technological evolution and methodology enhancement and giving a brief perspective on the most recent applications
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