1. What is your current occupation or primary role? Can you describe what you do?
I’m head intern of the research department at a neurosurgery clinic. I lead interns in the research department, organizing shifts, coordinating tasks, and training interns. I also do work with current papers that our department is working on as well as a big project that the clinic is involved in.
2. Does your role involve using any specific tools, websites, or applications? If so, which ones?
It requires me to use Microsoft teams, eCW, unity portal, outlook, Adobe.
3. How do you typically use these tools, websites, or applications in your work?
4. How would you describe your experience using these tools or platforms? (e.g., easy, challenging, intuitive, time-consuming)
It’s all pretty easy except for eCW as it can be annoying.
5. Are there parts of your workday where you face frustrations or repetition using certain tools/tech? Why?
Sometimes in eCW when you open different windows, it doesn’t let you click other things. To keep track of what we have to do, we send actions to each other. When we click on an action to see what it says, we can’t click into other windows for some reason so if the action requires you to cross-reference different things, you can’t do that. Sometimes we need to access the patient’s chart, but if we’re in the action then we have to close the action and then open the patient’s chart.
Microsoft Teams is helpful because it’s easy for communication. Microsoft Teams is easy for communication because it allows you to have different channels for different topics. For example, our practice has different channels for the Research Department, Clinic Department, and Surgery Department. If I’m not involved in a certain department, then I won’t need to be in that channel and if I am then I could limit the notifications I get so that I’m not bombarded with messages. It’s nice too because everything is in one place. All files and documents are in one place and we can access them directly from Microsoft Teams without having to go searching on another website or application.
6. If you could improve or change anything about these tools or platforms, what would it be, and how do you think it would enhance your experience?
I wish it was easier for our different websites to communicate with each other. We have so many apps but none of them are connected so we have to manually click into each website to check on it which is annoying.
7. Have you encountered any accessibility issues or challenges while using these tools or platforms? If so, please elaborate.
No, but I wouldn’t know cause I’m not impaired. It allows you to set the website to different languages other than eCW which require you to know English.
8. Do you feel that these tools meet your professional needs effectively? Why or why not?
Yes? Because some of them seem outdated. eCW software seems old. Too many clicks. I have to click so many times to get where I need to go.
9. If you had the opportunity to design a new tool or platform for your work, what key features or functionalities would you include?
I would try to change how to order things on eCW, but I’m not sure. When I click on something, instead of it going into a smaller window where I would have to click into something and exit out of it, I would make it so that when I click on something it would open a new tab and allow me to click back on the page I was on before with arrows.
10. How do you usually learn to use new tools or platforms for work? Do you rely on training, documentation, or experimentation?
Training. My higher ups teach me how to use it. They walk me through the steps and I have to memorize how to use it.
11. Can you walk us through a task that you often perform in a typical workday? (process of uploading an imaging/x-ray result)