Abstract
Background: The demand for rapid service design in the medical field has increased due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Concurrently, the deployment of service robots is expected to alleviate the chronic shortage of nurses. However, introducing new technologies necessitates behavioral changes among users, which presents a barrier to implementation. This study aims to develop a rapid and effective service design method to address these challenges.
Methodology: This study introduces a new service design method that integrates Rapid Ethnography and Behavioral Design. The method comprises four steps: research, analysis, design, and evaluation. In the research phase, we focus on the roles of the main information provider and the three institutional elements (regulative, normative, cultural-cognitive). In the analysis phase, data is examined using qualitative text analysis. The design phase involves creating new services based on existing jobs, using the identified institutional elements as constraints. In the evaluation phase, the CREATE action funnel is used to assess psychological barriers to service adoption.
Results: Utilizing the proposed method, we designed and implemented two services (hospital room and examination room guidance) at Shonan Kamakura General Hospital within approximately two months. During the demonstration experiment, we evaluated the services with two nurses. Although several user interface and user experiece improvement points were identified, the service concepts received positive feedback. Additionally, there was potential for operation by non-nursing staff, and the services were expected to reduce the workload of nurses.
Conclusion: The rapid service design method proposed in this study demonstrated that it is possible to effectively design and implement services that consider behavioral changes during emergencies such as the COVID-19 pandemic. However, limitations exist, including the absence of patient-side evaluation data, the evaluation at a single facility, and the lack of long-term effect validation. Future studies should aim to improve the method's effectiveness and generalizability through verification at various medical facilities and the measurement of long-term outcomes. This method also holds potential for application in new public and corporate services outside the medical field, warranting further research.