USABILITY OF RADIOLOGY AND IMAGE ARCHIVING SYSTEMS: A STUDY WITH HEALTH PROFESSIONALS IN BRAZIL
Usability Issues, Radiology Systems, Qualitative Analysis.
Medical systems, such as PACS (Image Archiving and Communication System) and RIS (Radiology Information System), have been increasingly important in medical practice and clinical interventions and are crucial for doctors and other healthcare professionals to perform their routine activities in a hospital environment. In Radiology, for example, appropriate usability and alignment with the tasks for these systems are essential, as they usually involve meticulous analysis that requires attention to details and complex image manipulation techniques for diagnosis. The images that are generated and manipulated by the radiology systems are essential assets to support the diagnosis in the health area. However, these radiology systems can present usability problems in handling. Considering the complexity of the tasks and the effects errors can have, usability issues may be harmful, as they compromise the efficiency of the process, generating incorrect diagnoses, delays in care, and the results. Despite several existing research studies on the usability of radiology systems in many countries, few studies on usability in small and medium hospitals in the Brazilian context have been reported. This project aims to conduct an in-depth study to evaluate the usability of radiology systems in Brazilian hospitals and compare the findings with the results of usability assessments in the literature. The issues identified in this study are essential to improving the interaction of health professionals in more complex activities. The study aims to address gaps, such as identifying the challenges for designers and the interaction of PACS in Brazil compared to the context of its use abroad. The results will be the consolidation of a set of recommendations for the design and evaluation of radiology systems, incorporating the aspects identified and related to the context of Brazil, the variety of availability of resources in hospitals, which is still limited in the sense of being based on textual descriptions of the problems reported in the literature and not in detailed tests.