During his Master Design study, designer and teacher Bartel Timmermans found his new challenge in doing research through design at Create4Care within the Erasmus MC in Rotterdam. C4C works on problems healthcare professionals encounter in their daily practice. Together with students from the Rotterdam University of Applied Sciences, they try to solve these problems through physical products. For example, what could be done to prevent tangling of infusion lines needed in the care of premature babies?
How can Create4Care sustainably increase ownership of care professionals in projects?
Bartel's main design question is: How can Create4Care sustainably increase ownership of care professionals in projects? For him, the relevance lies in improving the working conditions of people who work day in day out for the well-being of others.
His participants, two totally different groups, bring their own knowledge into C4C, and learn from each other. Healthcare workers introduce problems, help students with developing concepts and test prototypes and give feedback. Students get design cases offered by end-users, a complex organisation with various stakeholders, an extensive test environment and products that are actually made and implemented.
Bartel finds the innovative character and the great potential of the Create4Care studio truly interesting and challenging to be a part of. His design research is also relevant to other hospitals, which are already interested in setting up their own Create4Care-studio: it provides them with intervention and design tools that are easy to deploy.
