# A Novel Cognition-based Guidance System to Improve Surgical Safety

> **NIH NIH R01** · HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL · 2021 · $658,701

## Abstract

Medical errors causing preventable adverse events are the third leading cause of death in the U.S. The role of
human cognition in contributing to errors in complex healthcare environments is increasingly being recognized.
Many studies have demonstrated a direct relationship between cognitive performance metrics and patient
outcomes. Notwithstanding, the role of cognition in improving safety has not received enough attention. Cardiac
surgical OR is a high-impact area to improve patient safety and save lives. High mental workload during complex
cardiac surgery and associated reduction of spare attentional capacity is bound to have a detrimental effect on
a team's ability to detect their own errors. In the proposed project, we will explore and evaluate novel approaches
to using process and patient real-time data, and device status information dynamically and proactively to provide
guidance forward from the current surgical state. The proposed Cognition-based Guidance System will be
deployed intraoperatively. We believe that human errors in the cardiac OR can be reduced by supporting
individual and team interactions via dynamically-updated electronic guidance that are responsive to the details
of the on-going process (i.e., context-aware), to the patient's current medical condition (i.e., patient-aware), and
to cognitive workload demands on the participating clinicians (i.e., workload-aware).

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10198989
- **Project number:** 5R01HL126896-05
- **Recipient organization:** HARVARD MEDICAL SCHOOL
- **Principal Investigator:** MARCO A. ZENATI
- **Activity code:** R01 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** NIH
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** $658,701
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2016-09-01 → 2024-06-30

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10198989

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10198989, A Novel Cognition-based Guidance System to Improve Surgical Safety (5R01HL126896-05). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-23 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10198989. Licensed CC0.

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