Our workshop “First Aid Toolkit: Surviving Design Research in Healthcare” (before: common ground in healthcare research, bridging perspectives between healthcare and design research) was held at Design+Research+Society 2016 and hosted by PhD by Design.The workshop was organized by four members of TU Delft’s StudioLab: Tessa Dekkers (l), Bob Groeneveld (t), Boudewijn Boon (r), and Patrizia D’Olivo (b).
The workshop was held in a mezzanine space above one of the main halls. Different table set-ups allowed the participants to switch between sitting and standing exercises and discussion in both small and large groups.After a general introduction, participants were instructed to interview each other about specific events in groups of three.After the interview round in smaller groups, the participants were asked to share their event with the whole group.In a six person group, participants mapped their events on a event timeline which embodied five phases of a design research project: initiation, development, implementation, evaluation and communication. Participants could decide themselves in which phase their event belonged, but often did so in consultation with the other participants.
Multiple participants could work on the timeline at the same time, enhancing the opportunity to discuss ideas.
After mapping of the events, participants were invited to visualize possible causes, consequences and relations between events.
Participants used different line styles, arrows and small drawings to visualize connections between the elements on the timeline.Initially, the participants did not visualize no connections from their early events to later phases of the research. By the end of the mapping phase, some connections did came up. For example ‘constraints’ carry from implementation to the initiation phase.Participants were asked to find major, overlapping themes and indicate which events related to these major themes.The final event timeline consisted of six event cards, visual relations between event cards and two major themes: ‘relationship diplomacy’ (pink exclamation mark) and ‘care and reflexivity’ (yellow exclamation mark). The participants’ focus on the first phases of research is apparent from this picture.When the timeline was filled out, participants split in groups of three to formulate how-to questions related to the main themes ‘relationship diplomacy’ (shown here) or ‘care and reflexivity’.
By performing short ‘brainwriting’ exercises participants quickly and freely came up with ideas to tackle their how-to question.By using the solution canvas, which was prepared to include stimulating questions on the who, what, where, when, why, and how aspects of each idea, the participants formulated concrete possible solutions to the abstract strategy of ‘relationship diplomacy’.Team 1 (relationship diplomacy) suggested that diplomacy can be created by the concept ‘permission to play’ which describes a free play session that enables designers to think big and ‘beyond the now’. The participants suggest that play with physical materials may facilitate designers to communicate their work with the clinical team at a later point.Team 2 (care & reflexivity) suggested two ideas that allow for reflexivity when working in health care. These were presented to the whole group.The first idea ‘online and analogic platform’ is intended for all stakeholders throughout the project and should be created in order to constitute a community. The second idea ‘tools for training’ describes a check-in ‘buddy’ as part of a system that helps to protect both researchers and participants and prepare them before the actual field work.A final group photo with both solution canvasses wrapped up an inspiring session. We would like to thank our participants for participating and invite all those intrigued by the topic to contact us so we can continue the search for good practices in design research in healthcare.
