Human Factors

Human Factors is the study of how human performance can be affected by many variables including the environment we work in, organisational culture or interactions with other people and how this can sometimes lead to error and mistakes occurring. Within high-risk industries such as healthcare this is of particular importance as error could ultimately lead to a compromise in patient safety.

Developing an understanding of human factors can help to optimise the relationship between healthcare personnel and the systems they work in with a view to improving safety, efficiency and well-being.

Course Description

In this short course we will be exploring the following basic areas of human factors training in more detail:

• Why and how human failure occurs
• Factors that affect human performance
• Developing effective communication skills to enhance human performance
• Fostering a culture of transparency and openness within healthcare to enhance patient safety
• Developing strategies to make meaningful differences to our day to day work with human factors in mind