THE PHYSICIANS ACTIVITIES DURING MORNING ROUTINE WORK IN AN INTENSIVE-CARE UNIT - AN ERGONOMIC ANALYSIS

Qualitiy and efficacy control in the area of critical care medicine al so includes a requirement for an analysis of clinical activities. To d ate, little experience has been gained in the performance of such anal ysis. With the aid of a mobile data-collecting device, we recorded all the activities of physicians engaged in morning patient care, over a period of 41 working days, covering a total of just on 90 hours. The m edian duration for a routine care programme is 41 minutes and is broke n down as follows: 40 % for documentation, 29 % for information collec tion, 26 % for patient treatment, and 5 % for communication with colle agues. Improvements in efficacy may be expected in particular in the a reas of documentation and the search for information in the patient's medical record.