Human Factors in Practice: Strengthening Culture, Performance, and Safety
About this Event
AfPP’s Human Factors Symposium explores the real human factors challenges affecting perioperative teams today - discussing real stories, real challenges, and real solutions from the heart of perioperative practice.
Through powerful case studies and relatable day‑to‑day examples, you’ll uncover what truly drives safer surgery - from leadership behaviours and role boundaries to staffing pressures, robotics, and the hidden toll of burnout.
You’ll walk away with practical, immediately applicable learning that strengthens communication, reduces risk, and builds a more supportive, high‑performing theatre environment. 5 CPD hours awarded for attendance.
Disclaimer: Sessions are subject to change. Photography and filming will occur throughout the event.
Agenda
🕑: 08:45 AM - 09:20 AM
Registration, Coffee and Networking
🕑: 09:20 AM - 09:30 AM
Chair's Welcome Address
Host: Event Chair
🕑: 09:30 AM - 10:15 AM
Session 1: Leadership vs Fellowship: Creating Psychological Safety in Theatres
Host: Helen Fowler
Info: This session examines how leadership and followership operate as complementary behaviours that shape psychological safety and performance in perioperative teams. It highlights how staff can shift between directing, supporting and challenging roles to maintain clarity, adaptability and shared situational awareness. Drawing on research into team dynamics, HF and Safety I/Safety II thinking, the session uses examples from clinical practice to illustrate environmental pressures, communication demands and strategies that strengthen high performance teamwork and effective disruption management. LO: 1.Differentiate leadership and followership behaviours and explain how each contributes to safe, effective team performance
2. Apply principles of psychological safety and HF to enhance communication, shared awareness and adaptive decision making in clinical practice
3. Identify strategies to strengthen high performance teamwork, including managing disruptions & navigating environmental pressures
🕑: 10:15 AM - 11:00 AM
Session 2: Tackling Staffing Crisis and Training Gaps
Host: Maxine Page
Info: This session explores the growing staffing crisis and widening training gaps affecting theatres today. Using real examples and frontline stories, we’ll examine how shortages, skill mix challenges, and rapid turnover impact safety, workflow, and team confidence. Delegates will gain practical ideas to strengthen onboarding, support developing staff, and build more resilient teams despite ongoing workforce pressures.
🕑: 11:00 AM - 11:30 AM
Refreshments, Networking and Poster Viewing
🕑: 11:30 AM - 12:00 PM
Session 3: Role Clarity vs Role Creep: Maintaining Safe Boundaries
Host: Claire Kilbride
Info: As advanced perioperative roles continue to evolve, clarity of scope is essential to patient safety. This session explores the difference between structured role development and informal “role creep.”
Through a human factors' lens, it examines how ambiguity in scope can lead to blurred accountability, increased cognitive load and hidden organisational risk.
Practical strategies for safe integration of advanced roles will be discussed, including compulsory academic competency frameworks, consultant sign-off and governance oversight, supporting defensible and sustainable role progression within surgical teams. LO: 1. To understand why role clarity matters for SFAs and advanced practitioners, and how it supports safe practice in theatre.
2. To explore the difference between healthy role development and unintentional role creep within surgical teams.
3. To recognise practical ways we can protect professional boundaries while still progressing and growing advanced roles safely.
🕑: 12:00 PM - 01:00 PM
Session 4: KEYNOTE - From Theory to Theatre: Implementing Human Factors
Host: Dawn Benson
Info: Most serious incidents in perioperative care are not caused by lack of skill, they are caused by the conditions in which people work. Yet healthcare continues to focus on the individual rather than the system.
Drawing on the work of the Clinical Human Factors Group and anchored in the story of Elaine Bromiley, this plenary reframes human factors as a systems discipline, examining how tasks, tools, environment, and organisation affect the way people work, and what that means for safety in the perioperative setting. LEARNING OBJECTIVES: 1. Understand key strategies for applying human factors in perioperative settings
2. Learn practical steps for implementing human factors principles
3. Explore best practices for improving team performance
4. Lessons from Real-World Practice
🕑: 01:00 PM - 02:00 PM
Lunch, Networking and Poster Viewing
🕑: 02:00 PM - 02:45 PM
Session 5: Navigating the Challenges of Robotic Surgery
Host: Mr Asit Arora
Info: Robotic surgery is reshaping the modern operating theatre, but its rapid adoption brings new human factors challenges that teams must navigate with confidence. This session explores how robotics changes communication, situational awareness, workflow, and team roles - often in ways that aren’t immediately obvious. Using real theatre stories, practical examples, and case‑based scenarios, we’ll examine the pressures created by altered team positioning, reduced tactile feedback, steep learning curves, and shifting responsibilities.
The session highlights where risks can emerge and how human factors principles can support safer, smoother integration of robotic systems.
🕑: 02:45 PM - 03:00 PM
Tea and Coffee, Short Refreshment Break
🕑: 03:00 PM - 03:45 PM
Session 6: When High-Functioning isn’t Healthy: Rethinking Burnout
Host: Dr Derek Hrabovsky
Info: This session examines the clinical, organisational, and psychological impact of high-functioning burnout in healthcare. We will explore why conventional wellness models often fail under real-world pressure, and how chronic stress affects cognition, empathy, and decision-making. Attendees will gain awareness of the early warning signs of emotional and physiological depletion, particularly in professionals who appear to be coping. The session will offer practical insights and outline a range of evidence-based approaches clinicians can explore to sustain their performance and wellbeing - without compromising their health, relationships, or professional integrity. LO: 1. Understand the hidden signs and clinical impact of high-functioning burnout in healthcare professionals.
2. Explore why many workplace wellness strategies fall short in high-pressure clinical environments.
3. Gain insight into evidence-informed approaches to support personal and professional sustainability in demanding.
🕑: 03:45 PM - 04:00 PM
Chair's Closing Remarks
Host: Event Chair
Where is it happening?
Event Location & Nearby Stays:
GBP 52.14 to GBP 94.30
