Development of a Decision Aid for Family Surrogate Decision Makers of Critically Ill Patients Requiring Renal Replacement Therapy in ICU:A User-Centered Design for Rapid Prototyping

Objectives Renal replacement therapy(RRT)is increasingly adopted for critically ill patients diagnosed with acute kidney injury,but the optimal time for initiation remains unclear and prognosis is uncertain,leading to medical complexity,ethical conflicts,and decision dilemmas in intensive care unit(ICU)settings.This study aimed to develop a decision aid(DA)for the family surrogate of critically ill patients to support their engagement in shared decision-making process with clinicians.Methods Development of DA employed a systematic process with user-centered design(UCD)principle,which included:(i)competitive analysis:searched,screened,and assessed the existing DAs to gather insights for design strategies,developmental techniques,and functionalities;(ii)user needs assessment:interviewed family surrogates in our hospital to explore target user group's decision-making experience and identify their unmet needs;(iii)evidence syntheses:integrate latest clinical evidence and pertinent information to inform the content development of DA.Results The competitive analysis included 16 relevant DAs,from which we derived valuable insights using existing resources.User decision needs were explored among a cohort of 15 family surrogates,revealing four thematic issues in decision-making,including stuck into dilemmas,sense of uncertainty,limited capacity,and delayed decision confirmation.A total of 27 articles were included for evidence syntheses.Relevant decision making knowledge on disease and treatment,as delineated in the literature sourced from decision support system or clinical guidelines,were formatted as the foundational knowledge base.Twenty-one items of evidence were extracted and integrated into the content panels of benefits and risks of RRT,possible outcomes,and reasons to choose.The DA was drafted into a web-based phototype using the elements of UCD.This platform could guide users in their preparation of decision-making through a sequential four-step process:identifying treatment options,weighing the benefits and risks,clarifying personal preferences and values,and formulating a schedule for formal shared decision-making with clinicians.Conclusions We developed a rapid prototype of DA tailored for family surrogate decision makers of critically ill patients in need of RRT in ICU setting.Future studies are needed to evaluate its usability,feasibility,and clinical effects of this intervention.

Scenario-based Participatory Design for Pervasive Computing

Lots of pervasive computing researchers are working on how to realize the user-centered intelligent pervasive computing environment as Mark Weiser figured out.Task abstraction is the fundamentation of configuration for pervasive application.Based on task-oriented and descriptive properties of scenario,a scenario-based participatory design model was proposed to realize the task abstraction.The design model provided users and domain experts a useful mechanism to build the customized applications by separating system model into domain model and design model.In this design model,domain experts,together with users,stakeholders focus on the logic rules(domain model)and programmers work on the implementation(design model).In order to formalize the model description,a human-agent interaction language to transform users' goals and domain rules into executable scenarios was also discussed.An agent platform-describer used to link design and implementation of scenarios was developed to realize the configuration of applications according to different requirements.The demand bus application showed the design process and the usability of this model.

Integration of Environmental and Social Values in Cultural Spaces:Sustainable and Inclusive Wayfinding Materials for Museums

In the context of use of large museum centers,numerous national and international methodological experiments show that the wayfinding project must consider the needs of both habitual users(user-centered design)and local communities(design for communities)and the importance of environmental protection(eco-design)as a priority interest of the community.This“double target”,“user-centered”and“environment-centered”can be applied during the selection process of materials to be used in the project.With respect to these possibilities,this contribution intends to present the results of research focused on material characterization of the reception and distribution spaces of large museum centers.This characterization is based on use of sensory materials and aims to evaluate their impact on the usability and sustainability of wayfinding systems.The paper directed towards a proposal for organization of integrated information on new generation so-called smart materials;within the design of a wayfinding system,these can balance the aesthetic-perceptual and performance and environmental impact,in order to allow designers to make informed decisions oriented towards inclusion and sustainability.The study was addressed by conducting two phases of systematic literature and library review of materials.The investigations conducted led to achievement of a first research result which consists in the identification of a“standard sheet”for the mapping and cataloging of the materials used for wayfinding.The“standard sheet”allows organizing the information on smart,sensorial,and eco-friendly materials,balancing the aesthetic-perceptive component with the performance on the environmental impact along the entire life cycle in a circular perspective.This tool could guide designers towards an environmental communication project oriented towards sustainability and is effective for usability and wayfinding.

Exploiting User Centered Design Approach and Interactivity in Web Based Software Developing

Human computer interaction (HCI) and software engineering approaches are always taken into the account together in order to make the well-organized software. Interactive design is the significant part of new media which has been proposed to the world for the past decades, and it is a very proficient technique. Interactive maps add more dimensions of information;they become a more and more helpful tools and resources. This research clarifies the idea of how we can smooth the progress of presenting and communicating the essential information using interactive manner. The interactive map of Bangkok underground train and sky train navigation routes map was developed as the case study using user-centered design (UCD) methodology as the fundamental developing processes. The main objective of the work is to develop the friendly and usable web based software that reduce the confusion and help users save times. The software developing processes in this work tend to focus on the users. And also the essential idea of the research is to take the uses and gratification communication theory of the users into account with the intention of providing what user requires by finding the real users’ requirements. This means the user can control software according to their needs and software act or response according to user’s requests. The paper mentions the role of communication theory, human computer interaction, and user-centered design software developing.

Design and Evaluation of a User Interface for an Autonomous Agricultural Sprayer

This paper describes the design and evaluation of a user interface for a remotely supervised autonomous agricultural sprayer. The interface was designed to help the remote supervisor to instruct the autonomous sprayer to commence operation, monitor the status of the sprayer and its operation in the field, and intervene when needed (i.e., to stop or shut down). Design principles and guidelines were carefully selected to help develop a human-centered automation interface. Evaluation of the interface using a combination of heuristic, cognitive walkthrough, and user testing techniques revealed several strengths of the design as well as areas that needed further improvement. Overall, this paper provides guidelines that will assist other researchers to develop an ergonomic user interface for a fully autonomous agricultural machine.

Design and Evaluation of SIMpliLife, an NFC Platform to Ease Day-to-Day Actions of People＇s Life

In this paper the authors describe the design, prototyping and evaluation of SIMpliLife, a framework for mobile phones with the aim of making people＇s life easier, providing day-to-day services such as payment, ticketing and information retrieval by means of NFC （Near Field Communication） technology. It was developed via the collaboration between two research labs of Sapienza University of Rome： the RFID （Radio Frequency Identification） Lab and the Usability and Accessibility Lab （LUA）, both belonging to CATTID （Centre for Applications of Teleservices and of Technologies for Innovation in Digital world） research centre. Technically, SIMpliLife is a SIM-based platform for NFC mobile phones that interfaces several applications able to manage the abovementioned services. The high-level User Interface has been developed by means of Smart Card Web Server （SCWS） technology, thus providing enhanced user experience if compared to traditional SIM-based implementations based on SIM Toolkit.

User-centered development and performance assessment of a modular full-body exoskeleton (AXO-SUIT)

This paper presents the design and preliminary performance assessment of a full-body assistive exoskeleton(AXO-SUIT)for older adults.AXO-SUIT is a system that consists of separate lower-body and upper-body modular exoskeletons,which can be combined to form a full-body system to provide flexible physical assistance as needed.The full-body exoskeleton comprises 27 degrees of freedom(dof),of which 17 are passive and 10 active.It can assist people in walking,standing,carrying and handling tasks.A user-centered design approach was adopted throughout the development of the exoskeleton.This paper describes the design process of AXOSUIT,involving a review of user needs,a kinematic and kinetic motion study,and innovative system design.Tests with the developed systems were conducted on selected end-user subjects,covering both performance evaluations at different levels and useability testing.End-user testing results show the effectiveness of the exoskeleton in providing flexible physical assistance.

浅谈数字媒体创作与教学中的用户中心设计和内容设计

首先需要明确一个概念,何为用户中心设计:即以用户为中心的设计(User-CenteredDesign,简称UCD),是一种吸引人的、高效的用户体验的方法。以用户为中心的设计思想非常简单:在开发产品的每一个步骤中,都要把用户列入考虑范围^([1])。乍看之下,这个概念诞生于不断发展的设计心理学,的确这个概念也被广泛用于工业设计,产品设计乃至服务规划设计当中。然而它并不是一个设计学的分支,只是一个可以被用于多个领域的设计(研究)途径。本文的旨在分析当今的一些媒体如电影,短片,广告以及交互式网页的创作过程中,以用户(观众)的需求为最高优先级的可能性,和必要性。不过,用户中心设计在媒体创作中叶曾经被大量运用,最明显的就是广告,不过这种主观目的过于强烈的媒体作品有时已经超越了"以用户的需求作为中心"的概念,而是"让我的创作成为用户的需求",就像拿刀架着用户脖子问:"说,这个是不是你的需求?"可能这个例子举得并不恰当,但我只想说明一点,广告中虽然有"用户中心"的概念,但并非我所提倡的方向,而且广告也不是本文研究的主体。之所以会提出这个观点,是因为发现眼下很多媒体制作者把过多的精力投入到了技术,和制作手段的研究之上,显而易见的就是众多炫目的特效,3D技术,剪辑手法被广泛运用到一些电影,电视以及动态网页当中。但是,相当数量票房成功,或者获得良好口碑的作品,其实并没有使用很尖端的特技特效,而是这些作品的内容都非常符合观众时下的口味,兴趣以及需求,我当然并非否定科技的重要性,而是希望更多的制作者,特别是从事艺术、影视教育的老师和学生能够重视这环节。

Mobile Memory Management System Based on User’s Application Usage Patterns

Currently,the number of functions to improve user convenience in smartphone applications is increasing.In addition,more mobile applications are being loaded into mobile operating system memory for faster launches,thus increasing the memory requirements for smartphones.The memory used by applications in mobile operating systems is managed using software;allocated memory is freed up by either considering the usage state of the application or terminating the least recently used(LRU)application.As LRU-based memory management schemes do not consider the application launch frequency in a low memory situation,currently used mobile operating systems can lead to the termination of a frequently executed application,thereby increasing its relaunch time.This study proposes a memory management system that can efficiently utilize the main memory space by analyzing the application usage information.The proposed system reduces the application launch time by leaving the most frequently used or likely to be run applications in the main memory for as long as possible.The performance evaluation conducted utilizing actual smartphone usage records showed that the proposed memory management system increases the number of times the applications resume from the main memory compared with the conventional memory management system,and that the average application execution time is reduced by approximately 17%.

Restimate:Recovery Estimation Tool for Resilience Planning

The U.S.National Institute of Standards and Technology(NIST)published the Community Resilience Planning Guide in 2016.The NIST Guide advocates for a participatory process for developing a performance measurement framework for the jurisdiction’s resilience against a scenario hazard.The framework centers around tables of expected and desired recovery times for selected community assets,such as electricity,water,and natural gas infrastructures.The NIST Guide does not provide a method for estimating the expected recovery times.However,building high-fidelity computer models for such estimations requires substantial resources that even larger ju-risdictions cannot cost-justify.The most promising approach to recovery time estimation is to systematically use data elicited from people to tap into the wisdom of the(knowledgeable)crowd.This paper describes a novel research-through-design project to enable the computer-supported elicitation of recovery time series data.This work is the first in the literature to examine people’s ability to estimate recovery curves and how design in-fluences such estimations.Its main contribution to resilience planning is three-fold:development of a new elicitation tool called Restimate,understanding its potential user base,and providing insights into how it can facilitate resilience planning.Restimate is the first tool to enable evidence-based expert elicitation in any community with limited resources for resilience planning.Beyond resilience planning,those who facilitate high-stakes planning activities under large uncertainties(e.g.,mission-critical system design and planning)will benefit from a similar research-through-design process.

Applying design science approach to architectural design development

Unlike research methods for social and positivist sciences,those for architectural design lack a discipline-specific conceptual framework.Performative science aims at producing outcomes for future use and therefore needs a robust methodological approach that encompasses different techniques and methods supporting an evidence-based architectural design development.This study suggests that design science can be successfully applied to architectural design development and provides architects and designers with a powerful tool bridging the gap between research and design.In so doing,this study explores the application of design science to implement a user-centered design approach.A design challenge is reframed within the robust framework of design science by referring to a case study on refugee shelters.The traditional method by which shelter optimization is pursued by designers is questioned by involving the final users through an ethnographic approach within the framework of design science.The design outcome produced through this process is a list of specifications allowing designers to create different architectural solutions and matching the requirements expressed by future users.The authors argue that a user-centered design outcome can be achieved and validated through design science.