PMID- 14567727
OWN - NLM
STAT- MEDLINE
DCOM- 20031106
LR  - 20210527
IS  - 1543-2165 (Electronic)
IS  - 0003-9985 (Linking)
VI  - 127
IP  - 11
DP  - 2003 Nov
TI  - Five-year follow-up of routine outpatient test turnaround time: a College of 
      American Pathologists Q-Probes study.
PG  - 1421-3
AB  - CONTEXT: Timely reporting of outpatient tests can increase efficiency of care and 
      improve customer satisfaction. OBJECTIVES: We conducted a survey in 2002 to 
      determine how quickly hospital-based laboratories turned around routine requests 
      for 3 common assays and compared the results with a similar survey conducted in 
      1997. DESIGN: One hundred eighteen laboratories prospectively recorded the 
      collection-to-verification turnaround time for 9252 complete blood cell counts 
      (CBCs), 8832 thyroid tests, and 9193 basic metabolic panels. RESULTS: The median 
      facility reported all test results by 7:00 am of the weekday immediately after 
      the date of specimen collection. The bottom 10% of institutions reported 99% of 
      CBCs and basic metabolic panels within 1 day and 60% of thyroid tests within 1 
      day. The 65 institutions that participated in both the 1997 and 2002 surveys 
      showed significant overall improvement in turnaround time for all 3 types of 
      tests (P <.001). In 2002, federal institutions had significantly slower 
      turnaround times than nonfederal institutions for CBC tests (P <.001), thyroid 
      tests (P =.03), and basic metabolic panels (P <.001). Other demographic and 
      practice variables were not associated with turnaround time. CONCLUSION: The 
      turnaround time of routine outpatient tests appears to have improved between 1997 
      and 2002.
FAU - Valenstein, Paul
AU  - Valenstein P
AD  - Department of Pathology, St Joseph Mercy Hospital, Ann Arbor, Mich 48106-0995, 
      USA. paul@valenstein.org
FAU - Walsh, Molly
AU  - Walsh M
CN  - College of American Pathologists
LA  - eng
PT  - Comparative Study
PT  - Journal Article
PL  - United States
TA  - Arch Pathol Lab Med
JT  - Archives of pathology & laboratory medicine
JID - 7607091
SB  - IM
MH  - Blood Cell Count/standards/statistics & numerical data
MH  - Clinical Laboratory Techniques/*standards/statistics & numerical data
MH  - Follow-Up Studies
MH  - Humans
MH  - *Outpatients/statistics & numerical data
MH  - Pathology, Clinical/standards/statistics & numerical data
MH  - Patient Satisfaction
MH  - Program Evaluation/standards
MH  - Prospective Studies
MH  - Quality Assurance, Health Care/standards/statistics & numerical data
MH  - Thyroid Function Tests/standards/statistics & numerical data
EDAT- 2003/10/22 05:00
MHDA- 2003/11/07 05:00
CRDT- 2003/10/22 05:00
PHST- 2003/10/22 05:00 [pubmed]
PHST- 2003/11/07 05:00 [medline]
PHST- 2003/10/22 05:00 [entrez]
AID - CP3117 [pii]
AID - 10.5858/2003-127-1421-FFOROT [doi]
PST - ppublish
SO  - Arch Pathol Lab Med. 2003 Nov;127(11):1421-3. doi: 10.5858/2003-127-1421-FFOROT.