Practical Evaluation of the Emergency Usability Lab for Testing the Usability of Medical Devices in Emergency Situations

In healthcare, clinical activities are increasingly being relocated to patients’ home environment. Patients can thus continue their therapy in a self-determined manner at home. This trend challenges usability evaluations of medical devices, as patients represent a more heterogeneous user group in terms of experience and training than medical professionals and the use of medical devices by patients can also be influenced by their medical condition. The Emergency Usability Lab was developed as an approach for testing the usability of medical devices of home healthcare focusing on emergency situations. An emergency situation is determined as a situation the patient has to perform certain activities with a medical device while being limited in performance due to certain medical symptoms as dizziness, visual impairment or being short of breath.