As implementation of comprehensive health information technology (IT) systems becomes more widespread, concern regarding the unintended consequences of such technologies has increased as well. Usability testing is helpful for optimizing implementation of health IT. Researchers analyzed the impact of health IT use on relationships among clinicians over a year-long period across three academic intensive care units. In the two units with higher health IT use, clinicians were more likely to work in an isolated manner, which was associated with an adverse effect on situational awareness, communication, and patient satisfaction. A previous PSNet perspective discussed some of the pitfalls in the development, implementation, and regulation of health IT and what can be learned to improve patient safety going forward.

The intensive care unit is often cited as a model of interprofessional teamwork. This ethnographic study found that while interprofessional communication is common between intensive care unit team members, most of these interactions are more properly characterized as collaboration or coordination rather than true teamwork.

This systematic review found that simulation training based on crew resource management principles appeared to be more effective than didactic teaching at improving multidisciplinary teamwork behaviors in patient care situations. The authors suggest that further research focus on transferring learning to workplace practice and its impact on patient outcomes.

Leaders of quality improvement/patient safety and continuing education in Canada felt that efforts in these two domains were separated and that there were many opportunities to collaborate. However, they had differing views on how to best integrate programs.

According to this meta-analysis, interventions that applied cognitive, behavioral, and mindfulness approaches improved levels of physician burnout. A recent AHRQ WebM&M perspective with Dr. J. Bryan Sexton discusses physician resilience and safety culture.

Context has been identified as an important factor for successfully implementing patient safety improvements. This review highlights how ethnography can be used to identify and document factors that influence care delivery, including clinician behaviors and social relationships.

This review found that little is still understood about the processes, relationships, and organizational factors that influence interprofessional teamwork in intensive care units.

This qualitative study identified key elements of successful local safety interventions. One prominent strategy was stakeholder ownership of a patient safety issue in a supportive interprofessional learning community.

This narrative review proposes an approach that integrates concepts from continuing education, knowledge translation, patient safety, and quality improvement to promote collaboration in interdisciplinary health care improvement work.

The use of simulation is increasing in medical training, in part due to its success in other industries such as aviation. Although studies of simulation training have found positive effects on team communication and adherence to recommended processes, the effect of simulation on subsequent patient outcomes remains unclear. This study represents a significant advance in the simulation literature, as it found that anesthesia residents who underwent high-fidelity simulation training performed better at weaning patients from cardiopulmonary bypass than residents who underwent standard classroom-based training. Studies such as this, demonstrating that simulation training improves real-life clinical performance, strengthen the case for integrating simulation into medical education in an era of restricted duty hours.

This qualitative study of provider responses to critical incidents in the intensive care unit found that when individuals experienced emotional distress, other team members quickly experienced similar feelings, with consequent negative effects on team performance.

Housestaff traditionally lead cardiac arrest resuscitation ("code blue") teams at academic institutions after receiving training in Advanced Cardiac Life Support (ACLS). This survey of Canadian internal medicine residents found that most respondents felt that ACLS training alone did not leave them adequately prepared to lead resuscitations. Residents felt that their performance could be improved with greater supervision, feedback, and teamwork training to improve their leadership skills.