Department of Medical Informatics, Faculty of Medicine, Mashhad University of Medical Sciences, Mashhad, Islamic Republic of Iran.
Health Services Management Research Center, Institute for Futures Studies in Health, Kerman University of Medical Sciences, Kerman, Islamic Republic of Iran.
East Mediterr Health J. 2020 Dec 9;26(12):1456-1464. doi: 10.26719/emhj.20.029.
Laboratory information systems are widely used health information systems that have the potential to improve health care quality. Despite their benefits, many studies have indicated problems with user interaction with these systems due to poor interface design.
To evaluate the usability of a laboratory information system.
In this descriptive, cross-sectional study, we used heuristic evaluation to examine the user interface design of a laboratory information system in an academic hospital affiliated with Kerman University of Medical Sciences in 2017. This system is also used in 59 other Iranian hospitals .We investigated the usability of different parts of the usability of a laboratory information system (outpatient admission, inpatient admission, sample collection, and test result reporting). Data were collected using a standard form based on the heuristic evaluation method, and categorized based on their severity and violated heuristics. The content validity was confirmed by 3 medical informatics specialists.
We identified 162 usability problems. In terms of the heuristics, the highest number of problems concerned flexibility and efficiency of use (n = 32, 19.75%) and the lowest concerned help users recognize, diagnose, and recover from errors (n = 2, 1.23%). In terms of different modules of the system, the highest number of problems (n = 51, 31.48%) concerned outpatient admission and the lowest (n = 29, 17.9%) concerned sample collection. In terms of severity, 45.06% of the problems were rated as major.
Despite widespread use of laboratory information systems, their user interface design has usability problems that diminish the quality of user interaction with these systems and may affect the quality of health care. Consideration of standards and principles for user interface design, such as the heuristics used in this study, could improve system usability.
实验室信息系统是广泛使用的健康信息系统，具有提高医疗质量的潜力。尽管它们有很多好处，但许多研究表明，由于界面设计不佳，用户与这些系统的交互存在问题。
评估实验室信息系统的可用性。
在这项描述性的、横断面研究中，我们在 2017 年使用启发式评估检查了隶属于克尔曼医科大学的学术医院的实验室信息系统的用户界面设计。该系统也在伊朗的 59 家其他医院使用。我们研究了实验室信息系统不同部分的可用性（门诊入院、住院入院、样本采集和测试结果报告）。使用基于启发式评估方法的标准表格收集数据，并根据其严重程度和违反的启发式进行分类。内容有效性由 3 名医学信息学专家确认。
我们发现了 162 个可用性问题。就启发式而言，与使用的灵活性和效率相关的问题最多（n = 32，19.75%），与帮助用户识别、诊断和从错误中恢复相关的问题最少（n = 2，1.23%）。就系统的不同模块而言，问题最多的是门诊入院（n = 51，31.48%），问题最少的是样本采集（n = 29，17.9%）。就严重程度而言，45.06%的问题被评为主要问题。
尽管实验室信息系统广泛使用，但它们的用户界面设计存在可用性问题，降低了用户与这些系统交互的质量，并可能影响医疗质量。考虑用户界面设计的标准和原则，如本研究中使用的启发式，可以提高系统的可用性。
