Strategies could make for safer shift changes at...( ortant: Face-to-face verbal updat...),Health

Face-to-face verbal update with interactive questioning. In all four industries, the outgoing employee met with his or her replacement before leaving. That allowed for quick verbal and non-verbal (gesturing) communication of the previous shift's events, and gave the incoming employee the opportunity to ask questions. "That strategy may seem obvious, but healthcare workers don't often see their replacements, just because of the way the work has been designed," Patterson said. "Yet the attitude we encountered from these other industries was, 'how else would you do an update?'"

Unambiguous transfer of responsibility. The person who is taking responsibility should know that they are responsible, but everybody else should know it, too. At the ambulance dispatch center, for instance, everybody knew that incoming dispatchers hadn't officially taken over until they plugged their headphones into the control desk. In fact, one dispatcher felt that it was "almost insulting" for an incoming person to plug in headphones before the outgoing person had officially transferred responsibility, because it was "a sign of taking over."

Make it clear to others at a glance which personnel are responsible for which duties at a particular time. In each industry studied, the outgoing person always maintained responsibility until the handoff of duties was complete, and he or she would stay to work through any crisis that emerged during the handoff.

Overhear others' updates. Employees besides the incoming and outgoing ones can benefit from hearing others discuss the current state of events. They can also speak up when they hear information that isn't correct, to help prevent errors during the next shift. At Johnson Space Center, for instance, all the employees overhear these exchanges on a continuous audio feed.

The last item highlights one of the potential benefits of shift changes, according to study co-author David Woods, a professor in the
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Contact: Emily Patterson
Patterson.150@osu.edu
614-688-3938
Ohio State University
15-Apr-2004