Supporting Patient Healing through ICUsmartCARE: Technologies that Enable Family Collaboration, Presence, and Information Flow

Research suggests that family members of ICU patients have not been meaningfully engaged in the care process, putting them at risk for experiencing fear, depression, stress, and disruptions of family relationships. To address this problem, we propose the design of a family-centered communication-information technology, ICUsmartCARE. Its purpose is to support collaboration by providing families increased (remote) access, presence, and interaction with the patient and patient data-without placing additional information-sharing burden on critical care clinicians. The approach will be novel in three ways: (1) Family-centered framework approach to accessing real-time bedside patient data and synchronized-video, (2) Mobile-health support for family-patient-clinician collaboration--using two integrated (and validated) technologies (CISCO Jabber Guest and Medical Information Visualization Assistant), and (3) Cognitive systems engineering methodology to conduct family-centered data collection/analysis, interaction design, and testing of the socio-technical system. The commercial potential of ICUsmartCARE is considerable in supporting effective and efficient ICU family-centered care.