Human Factors and Environmental Cleaning in Operating Rooms

Dr. Lamia Alam, 22′ PhD Applied Cognitive Science and Human Factors (ACSHF) was this week’s guest on the podcast “Infection Controls Matters; Discussions on Infection Prevention” with Martin Kiernan. Dr. Alam’s research was part of the 2023 Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA) Spring Conference in Seattle, WA. Lamia presented the work of her research group at Johns Hopkins titled “Environmental Cleaning in Operating Rooms: A Systematic Review of Human Factors Relating to Cleaning in the Operating Room”.

Podcast guest, CLS alum Dr. Lamia Alam

Lamia received her doctoral degree in ACSHF, fall 2022, under the direction of Dr. Shane Mueller. She is currently a postdoctoral research fellow at Johns Hopkins Armstrong Institute for Patient Safety and Quality.

The SHEA conference is designed for physicians, infection preventionists, healthcare epidemiologists, infectious disease specialists, microbiologists, nurses, pharmacists, and other healthcare professionals interested in healthcare epidemiology, infection prevention, surveillance, research methods, patient safety, environmental issues and quality improvement.


Relevant papers: 1. A. Xie, et al. 2018 Improving Daily Patient Room Cleaning: An Observational Study Using a Human Factors and Systems Engineering Approach IISE Transactions on Occupational Ergonomics and Human Factors 6 3-4 178-191 https://10.1080/24725838.2018.1487348

2. C. Rock, et al. 2016 Using a Human Factors Engineering Approach to Improve Patient Room Cleaning and Disinfection Infect Control Hosp Epidemiol 37 12 1502-1506 https://10.1017/ice.2016.219