R--BASED ENGINEERING PATIENT SAFETY REVIEWS -

This sources sought notice is for market research purposes in accordance with the Federal Acquisition Regulation (FAR) Part 10. It does not constitute a solicitation and is not to be considered as a commitment by the Government. This sources sought notice is a Request for Information (RFI) before the release of any resultant solicitation. This is not a request for a proposal and does not guarantee the release of any solicitation. ENGINEERING PATIENT SAFETY REVIEWS 1. Background: Patient safety is a continuous process that needs to be an integral component within healthcare delivery systems. Healthcare information technology (HIT) has been recognized as a key factor in enabling healthcare facilities to have the ability to provide accurate and usable information to assist clinicians, nurses, pharmacists, allied health care professionals and other personnel that interact with and provide quality care to patients. Patient safety is focused on measuring, monitoring, and improving the safety of the IT products and processes in support of the medical providers and IT users and ultimately, of the patients. Therefore, the OI&A Informatics Patient Safety program seeks qualified human factors expertise to incorporate safety principles using best practices such as user centered design based upon human factors engineering principles and best practices. This expertise will also include the incorporation of usability testing into the development, and pre/post-release evaluation process. 2. Scope: The Contractor shall provide Cognitive Engineering based patient safety review identifying the Human Factors principles associated with the patient and identified software projects/products, hardware projects/products, and ergonomic requirements for the VHA Electronic Health Record using VA and Commercial Best Practices. This information will be used by the Director of Informatics Patient Safety to identify the patient safety risks associated with software applications and systems. The Contractor shall perform human factors engineering assessments to document/identify user tasks and provide recommendations for the design of user interfaces during the product development cycle based upon human factors engineering principles and best practices. The Contractor shall identify the components that will require a Risk Management Plan and identify possible remediation strategies. The Director shall make the final determination for all policy and procedural change recommendations to the field. The following Information is requested in response to this RFI; - 1) Name of your company with DUNS #, identify Business size of your company, (Small Business, Large Business, Disadvantaged Business, Service Disabled Veteran Owned, Veteran Owned, Woman Owned or HUBZone) - 2) Identify if offered as open market commercial and or GSA Schedule provider, list Schedule number if applicable. - 3) Capabilities/Qualifications - Provide the following information for each functional area in the "REQUIREMENTS" section above. Who are your frequent customers? Provide point of contact. PLEASE LIMIT YOUR DOCUMENT TO 10 TOTAL PAGES - 4) Please include contact information, including the name of the point of contact, email address, and telephone number for your company - 5) What is the normal length of a contract for the services described above? - 6) What type of contract (Labor Hour, Time & Material, or Fixed Price)? - 7) Do you perform the work on-site? Can it be provided off-site? - 8) What kinds of performance incentives are used? - 9) What kinds of performance assessment methods are commonly used? - 10) What are the common qualifications of the people who are providing the services? This notice does not restrict the Government to an ultimate acquisition approach. All firms responding to this sources sought notice are advised that their response is not a request that will be considered for contract award. All interested parties will be required to respond to the resultant solicitation separately from their response to this sources sought notice. SUBMIT YOUR RESPONSE TO contact@example.gov BY 20 May, 2011 9am EST. SUBJECT LINE SHOULD INCLUDE RFI NUMBER AND TITLE.