Engineering Whole Health into Hospital Care to Improve Wellness: The M-Wellness Laboratory (M-Well)

PROJECT SUMMARY/ABSTRACT: The University of Michigan’s Patient Safety Learning Laboratory (M-Well Lab) will design, implement, and evaluate innovative, systems-based approaches that can improve patient safety by expanding the ways in which we enhance the wellness of hospitalized patients and their healthcare providers. The wellness of patients is inextricably linked to the emotional, mental, and physical health of their providers. Poor provider wellness negatively impacts the entire healthcare organization, reducing both care quality and patient satisfaction. Additionally, provider burnout is associated with increased risk of patient safety incidents and poorer quality of care due to reduced professionalism. Identifying ways in which to improve wellness for both patients and their providers thus presents a novel opportunity to improve patient safety. We propose 3 related specific aims. We will start by systematically analyzing the experience of both patients and physicians through the healthcare system using a tool borrowed from engineering, mapping a “customer journey” of patients and physicians in order to better understand time constraints and opportunities to improve their wellness. Specific Aim 1, based on the Circle of Health model, will enhance patient wellness by designing, implementing, and evaluating a Whole Health inpatient bundle of integrative medical practices. Specific Aim 2 will address provider burnout and enhance wellness through two interlinking projects. First, we will conduct a national survey of hospitalists to better understand elements that promote physician wellness, focusing on possible protective factors such as religiosity and spirituality. Second, we will design and implement educational interventions intended to teach hospitalists how best to foster “sacred moments” in the hospital setting. Specific Aim 3 will build on Specific Aims 1 and 2 by developing programs to promote interconnectedness between patients and physicians, using architectural design, human factors, and the arts to design an optimal hospital room healing environment. By connecting investigators from diverse disciplines – engineering, medicine, nursing, human factors, architectural design, pastoral care, business, and others – all of whom share a common interest in using healthcare engineering to enhance patient safety, we will cover the full spectrum of translational research: problem analysis and design; solution development, evaluation, and implementation; and ultimately, dissemination. We will develop and test novel approaches that have the potential to save lives, reduce medical costs, and improve patient and family satisfaction with the healthcare they receive, while simultaneously enhancing the emotional, mental, and physical health of their providers.