Judith Tiferes

Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center

Papers

Total Citations

121

H-Index

About

Judith Tiferes is a leading researcher in the field of surgical team dynamics, with a specific focus on communication and coordination during robot-assisted surgery (RAS). Her work bridges human factors engineering and surgical safety, exploring how the physical separation of the surgeon from the rest of the team—a defining feature of RAS—impacts team performance. Tiferes’s most cited paper, “The Loud Surgeon Behind the Console” (2016, 66 citations), provides a foundational analysis of team activities in the RAS environment, revealing critical challenges in coordination. She further advanced this work by investigating the role of nonverbal cues, particularly gestures, in her 2018 paper (51 citations), which argues that these subtle signals are essential for maintaining situational awareness when verbal communication is limited. Her research systematically identifies communication gaps that can lead to surgical failures, offering actionable insights for improving team training and OR design. By highlighting the often-overlooked multimodal nature of team interactions—including both verbal and nonverbal exchanges—Tiferes has made a significant impact on how surgical teams are trained and evaluated, contributing to safer, more efficient robotic surgeries.