I’m teaching Healthcare Informatics (HI) for this semester. Most of the students enrolled for this subject are medical doctors. For this semester, I have 3 classes of HI- Putrjaya, Johor and Negeri Sembilan.
Healthcare Informatics is a multidisciplnary subject that blend information systems with psychology, behavioural sciences and cognitve science. It aims to understand how technology is use and developed for healthcare industry. Healthcare industry has many problems or issues related to technology; in hardware, system, procedures and process and also in human management. Thus, it is important for healthcare provider or practitioners to understand the implementation and implication of technology in their work setting.
The students previously have taken Business Information Systems; which covers fundamental topic of information systems in many industries such as marketing and retail, education and logistics. In HI, the students are expected to apply their knowledge in information system to healthcare context.
The approach
For this subject, students need to design and develop a prototype of healthcare informatics application using the design thinking approach. To most of them, this is the most challenging tasks since they did not have any background in designing and also developing a prototype. The design thinking approach is an interesting way to come up with an inclusive and empathic design for user.
The subject requires the students to do user research, come up with user personas, generate ideas and design, develop and test the prototype. As a researcher in Human Computer Interaction, I am very happy to expose the students to design thinking approach- which focuses on trying to solve the problems of user.Design Thinking is a human-centered, iterative process that designers use to tackle problems. In HCI, we have user-centered design which also focuses on user, is iterative and involve multidisplinary groups.
Sounds similar right?! You can read further on user-centered design and design thinking here.
The students
I started with the Putrajaya group- a medium size group that consists of some senior doctors and administrators. Nusrat, an international student who was in her final semester also joined the team. With Nusrat in the group, I had to speak in English, fully. I also have to remind all the students to do that too:-) The students were very participative and hardworking.
I have younger medical doctors in the Negeri Sembilan group. They are a bit reserved compared to the other groups, but likewise hardworking and attentive. I have taught them in BIS, and I can see that they are more participative in the HI class.
My JKNJ class is always noisy- good noisy. Participative and always try to deliver their best. The HI class is their second class with me; first was the BIS.
The HI Putrajaya class ended in January 2021. I will have a last class with the JKNJ and JKNNS in April.