Category: News

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Julie Simmons Ivy

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On November 27th, the Providing Better Healthcare Through Systems Engineering seminar series welcomed Julie Simmons Ivy, PhD, MS, the University of Michigan’s Industrial and Operations Engineering Department Chair. She arrived to speak about the significant disparities in health outcomes for birthing people. Students, faculty, staff, clinicians, and community members gathered to discuss the causes and potential solutions to this problem.

“I’m not going to give you a presentation…we are going to have a discussion,” Ivy opened.

Before diving into the topic of maternity disparities, Ivy highlighted her identity as an industrial engineer, sharing, “I think of the world through systems and connections,” and that she often asks herself, “We can do this better. Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Andrew Fine

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This week’s Providing Better Healthcare Through Systems Engineering seminar series welcomed Andrew M. Fine, MD, MPH to share his insight into using artificial intelligence (AI) as a tool to mitigate physician burnout. Students, faculty, staff, clinicians, and community members gathered to discuss both the potential and the risks of AI-supplemented healthcare.

Fine specializes in pediatric emergency medicine, innovating both children’s healthcare and public health at large. As a Senior Associate Physician in Pediatrics at the Boston Children’s Hospital, Fine has experienced firsthand the effects of provider burnout. He also serves as an Associate Professor in Pediatrics and Emergency Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Continue Reading »

Celebrating Another Year of Healthcare Innovation at 2023 CHEPS Symposium

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On Monday, November 6th, the ninth annual Center for Healthcare Engineering & Patient Safety (CHEPS) Symposium brought together students, alumni, faculty, clinicians, and community members to celebrate another year of multidisciplinary healthcare innovation.

Hosted in U-M’s Lurie Engineering Center, the event highlighted how the fusion of engineering with healthcare can provide robust solutions to difficult problems, addressing the complexities of patient safety, enhancing healthcare operations and delivery, and ultimately improving outcomes for all. Posters from sixteen diverse research projects tackled subjects from prenatal care access to competing scheduling requirements, from inbox-related provider burnout to allocating specialty care for patients with lung and liver cancer. Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Karthik Ramani

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On Monday, October 23rd, Karthik Ramani, MD joined CHEPS in discussion at the Providing Better Healthcare through Systems Engineering seminar series. Alongside his work as the Medical Director of Interventional Nephrology and Vascular Access Services at Michigan Medicine, Ramani is pursuing his MBA at U-M’s Stephen M. Ross School of Business and holds particular interest in pursuing greater equity and diversity in clinical trials.

He began with some facts:

  • While minority populations make up 39% of the U.S., they make up only 25% of clinical study participants.
  • While 40% of White clinical trial candidates ultimately enroll in studies, that number drops to 23% for Black clinical trial candidates.
Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Andrew Rosenberg

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“We digitized U.S. healthcare . . . We are now trying to digitalize our workflow, and some is working well, and some is not.”

This is how Andrew Rosenberg, MD, Chief Information Officer of Michigan Medicine and Associate Professor of Anesthesiology and Internal Medicine, opened this week’s Providing Better Healthcare through Systems Engineering seminar session. His presentation, titled “Digitization-Digitalization-Digital Transformation: Changing Healthcare Paradigms” introduced students, faculty, staff, and community members from U-M and beyond to the complex reality that is adapting a centuries old profession—medicine—to the digital age.

Digitization, as Rosenberg described, refers to the creation of accessible digital infrastructure. One common example of digitization has been the move away from paper medical records to electronic health record systems. Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Julia Kramer

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This week at the Providing Better Healthcare Through Systems Engineering seminar series, students, staff, faculty, clinicians, and community members gathered to discuss client-provider tension in contraceptive care for low-resource communities.

Julia Kramer, PhD, MPH is an Assistant Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Michigan. In her research, she focuses on equity-oriented engineering solutions to modern healthcare issues. This Monday, Kramer presented an insightful seminar on human-centered design as it applies to her research promoting rights-based family planning for contraceptive care.

Contraceptive care and human-centered design

With a variety of contraceptive methods available, such as insertive IUDs, hormone injections, and oral contraceptives, it can be difficult for patients in low-resource communities to feel adequately informed and advised in their contraceptive healthcare journey. Continue Reading »

Alumnus Ryan Chen speaks at IOE 101 Career Seminar Series

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On Friday, September 29th, Center for Healthcare Engineering & Patient Safety (CHEPS) alumnus Ryan Chen participated in the Industrial and Operations Engineering (IOE) 101 Career Seminar Series hosted by the University of Michigan’s IOE Department.

Having graduated from U-M in 2014 with dual degrees in IOE and Euphonium Performance, Chen told students and faculty about the formative experiences he had as a student at Michigan. Chen began working at CHEPS shortly after its 2011 founding, noting that he still keeps in touch with some of the friends he made here years ago.

“One of the places I really got to learn a lot from was CHEPS, and that is where I really formed myself as an intellect at Michigan.” Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Sung Won Choi and Jodyn Platt

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Jodyn Platt (left) and Sung Won Choi.

Once considered a “last resort” for those diagnosed with bone marrow cancer, bone marrow transplants (BMTs) have become a more successful treatment option in recent decades. As the number of BMTs performed around the world continues to rise, so do questions about its ethical complexities.

On Monday, September 25th, the Center for Healthcare Engineering & Patient Safety (CHEPS) partnered with Sung Won Choi, MD, MS and Jodyn Platt, MPH to discuss the intricacies of informed consent.

Bone marrow basics

Depending on the kind of cancer a patient is diagnosed with, there are different methods for BMT: while autologous transplants allow a person to “donate” their own pre-chemotherapy stem cells to themselves, allogeneic transplants require donation from another person. Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Max Li and Dana Habers

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From left: Max Li, Amy Cohn, Dana Habers.

This week at the Providing Better Healthcare Through Systems Engineering Seminar Series, students, staff, faculty, clinicians, and community members had the opportunity to discuss the intersection of two distinct industries: pharmaceuticals and aerospace.

Drones and privacy

Max Li, PhD, MSSE is an Assistant Professor of Aerospace Engineering and Industrial and Operations Engineering at U-M. He joined us on Monday to offer his expertise on drones—a novel subject for many working in healthcare.

One of the main considerations necessary when speaking about drones is privacy. Just like with commercial air traffic, tracking and surveillance (via radar, satellites, etc.) Continue Reading »

CHEPS Fall 2023 Seminar Series: Alexander T. Janke

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Dr. Janke (left) and Professor Cohn.

Same series, new structure

This year in U-M’s Industrial and Operations Engineering (IOE) 813 course, the Center for Healthcare Engineering & Patient Safety (CHEPS) is experimenting with a new format focused on enhancing innovation by leveraging resources across the University.

Titled Providing Better Healthcare Through Systems Engineering and led by Professor Amy Cohn, this series comprises eleven brainstorming sessions with healthcare professionals about ways to strategically utilize engineering to improve care delivery for all. Instead of a traditional lecture series, these sessions are intended to function more as “no such things as bad ideas” brainstorming workshops. Continue Reading »