CLINICAL LAB SCIENEC

CHAPTER 10: QUALITY ASSURANCE 261
Efficiency
Efficiency of methodology should be chosen by selecting the test method with
the greatest number of correct results when divided by the total number of tests.
An efficient method for most purposes in the medical laboratory would consider
economical measures such as cost of reagents, time for each test (dwell time),
and even ease of operation of equipment and storage of supplies.
Reporting of Results
Results are most often reported directly via computer to patient areas and even
to physicians’ offices. Simultaneous storage of patient results and dissemination
to a patient’s chart, whether in a hospital, clinic, or private physician’s office, are
done quickly and effortlessly. Point-of-care testing, also called near-patient testing,
requires that all personnel who perform procedures with bedside equipment
perform function checks and QC, which is stored in the instrument and in some
cases is transmitted to the laboratory’s LIS. Remember that point-of-care testing
is most often performed by those other than medical laboratory personnel.
Computer Processes within the
Clinical Laboratory
There are defined processes by which data are entered into a computer system.
The data are often stored as information in a form that are not readily readable
by the laboratory worker. Computers process and correlate data to provide
reports that may be distributed to the clinicians for their review. Some of the
terms used in computer procedures are hardware, CPU (central processing unit),
memory, storage media, along with input and output devices. In the laboratory, a
large amount of data are produced and disseminated on a constant basis. An LIS
is normally installed in any laboratory of even modest size. Information is coordinated
by the system to achieve delivery of patient reports in a timely manner
and in an organized format. This would not be possible without highly sophisticated
computer systems capable of receiving data input from a large variety of
instruments as well as from manual entry of data produced when manual methods
of testing are performed. The following components are required to operate
these large systems.
Central Computer Memory
Many of the calculations and storage of QC data and patient results are accomplished
within the central memory of the instruments. Some facilities use storage
for permanent records on tape drives or other forms of memory for long-term
record keeping. When storing large amounts of data, tape can be substantially
less expensive than disk or other data storage options. Permanent storage has
been greatly facilitated by improved computer hardware and software over the
past few years and more innovative methods will undoubtedly follow.
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