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PERSISTENT CASE ENTRY PDIs

Jeff Clawson, M.D.

Jeff Clawson, M.D.

Ask Doc

By Jeff Clawson, M.D.

Dr. Clawson:

If Instructions pop up, and before continuing in ProQA, dispatchers/calltakers need to click the red X to dismiss the red instructions box. This isn’t always obvious, and if they don’t dismiss the message box, they think they’re stuck in unresponsive software.

This software design is sometimes confusing, as the red box looks like an instruction box, not an overlay box that needs to be dismissed before continuing.

Thanks,

Ken Pitts

Public Safety Systems Manager

City of Cambridge, Emergency Communications Department

Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA

Ken:

Thank you for reaching out to us regarding your issue regarding closure/persistence of the Case Entry PDI box. While this box can be closed via the red “X” box in the upper-right corner, we designed it to also be closed in three other ways that are consistent with navigation within some other areas of the program. They are the:

  1. Escape button
  2. Space bar
  3. Enter key

It was done this way to allow folks that are mainly keyboard users to be able to close it without reaching for the mouse. Personally, I prefer to use the space bar, as it is the most movement economical to utilize. We will consider making the box slightly smaller width-wise to make it appear more as a box and not part of the Case Entry screen, which may help that perception; we will also consider adding a “Close window” button within the screen to identify beyond doubt that it needs to be closed via any of the five different methods.

Again, thanks for contacting PDC and the Academy with this issue, as this is how we evolve the protocol, software, and our QA processes. To date, there have been over 10,000 modifications, logic changes, and improvements in ProQA alone.

Best regards and Happy Holiday Season to you, your family, and your center…Doc

P.S. If the above alterations are made, we will notify you of its availability in a future push of ProQA.

Dr. Clawson:

Thank you for your response.

And to be clear (and sorry if I belabor the issue), the fact that there are four or five methods to close the PDI box does little to help the calltaker who is unaware that there is a box that needs to be acknowledged and dismissed. They are in the middle of a cardiac call, and believe the software has frozen on them.

Making the box slightly smaller or adding a “Close window” button should go a long way to avoid confusion.

Thanks,

Ken

Finally, the Doc adds:

A software proof sheet was submitted on 12-27-16 to PDC Development to enact both of these suggested changes, which have since been done via Proof 6556.