Activity Theory-based Needs Finding

Activity Theory-based Needs Finding

The challenge: developing a new framework for understanding socio-technical needs for development of medical devices in low-resource environments

Collaborators: I collaborated with Dr. Van der Loos, Dr. Ratto, Dr. Hodgeson, Uganda Sustainable Trauma Orthopedic Program (USTOP), CoRSU Rehabilitation Center (3D-PrintAbility Project), Engineers-in-Scrubs program and the Biomedical Engineering Student Team for this project.

The approach:

1. Developed a novel needs-finding method called Activity Theory-based Needs Finding
2. Performed a preliminary application of the technique on the 3D-PrintAbility Project in Uganda
3. Conducted a comparative analysis of this new technique versus a well-established needs finding method used in the Bio-design process with engineering student design teams

Key learning or insights: Combining a method of social system analysis such as Activity Theory with an analysis of the technical needs can create more clear connections between social and technical needs. Refer to publications at EMBC 2016 and ICED 2017 proceedings for a summary of this work.

The impact of findings: The findings from this work contributed to the field of design theory research, specifically medical device development challenges for low-resource environments.

My specific role: This work was completed as part of my thesis research project for my masters. I identified the need for this kind of research, developed the technique and devised the method to test it.