Jan 27, 2017 | Instruments & Equipment, Laboratory Instruments & Laboratory Equipment, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Management & Operations
To match the supply of blood products to demand, a clever entrepreneur has created an award-winning business that may help clinical laboratories better manage the cost of blood products in their hospitals and health systems
There’s something new and exciting in the world of blood banking and medical laboratory medicine. It’s a unique approach to matching the availability of blood products to the demand for those same products and it’s catching the attention of medical laboratory directors and blood bankers in many of the nation’s hospitals.
How did an ice storm and a Super Bowl factor into the development of an innovative and disruptive technology that addresses a persistent gap in the US blood products supply chain? In February 2011, central Texas was hit by fierce weather that not only disrupted flights, snarled traffic, and threatened Super Bowl XLV, it also impacted the local and regional hospitals’ ability to access blood for patients in need. Enter a young entrepreneur who saw a critical problem and understood that the raw materials for a solution already existed. (more…)
Nov 16, 2016 | Instruments & Equipment, Laboratory Instruments & Laboratory Equipment, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Testing
Machine learning software may help pathologists make earlier and more accurate diagnoses
In Boston, two major academic centers are teaming up to apply big data and machine learning to the problem of diagnosing cancers earlier and with more accuracy. It is research that might have major implications for the anatomic pathology profession.
A collaborative effort between teams at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) and Harvard Medical School (HMS) has resulted in an innovation that could result in more accurate diagnoses in the pathology laboratory. The teams have been working on a machine learning software program that will eventually function as an artificial intelligence (AI) to improve the accuracy of diagnostics. They hope to someday build AI-powered computer systems that can accurately and quickly interpret pathology images. (more…)
Oct 31, 2016 | Compliance, Legal, and Malpractice, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Uncategorized
Recent studies indicate that high readmission rates often may be due to patient demographics, giving clinical laboratories an opportunity to use lab test results in ways that minimize the need for specific patients to be readmitted
Medicare’s efforts to reduce hospital readmission rates have left most hospitals facing reductions in Medicare payments. However, a recent ranking of hospitals by the Modern Healthcare Data Center indicates that influences other than inferior care—such as patient demographics—can affect 30-day readmission rates.
These findings are noteworthy for pathologists and clinical laboratory managers operating medical laboratories in hospitals and health systems. That’s because readmission rates impact a hospital’s budget. Thus, less revenue can cause hospital administrators to reduce spending for clinical laboratory and anatomic pathology services. (more…)
Aug 31, 2016 | Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Testing, Management & Operations
Use of these new technologies creates opportunities for clinical laboratories and pathologists to add more value when collaborating with physicians to advance patient care
Ongoing improvements in point-of-care testing are encouraging one major academic medical center to apply this mode of testing to the diagnosis of hospital-acquired infections (HAIs). This development should be of interest to clinical laboratory professionals and pathologists, since it has the potential to create a different way to identify patients with HAIs than medical lab tests done in the central laboratory.
Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH), Harvard Medical School’s (HMS’) largest teaching hospital, has developed a prototype diagnostic system that works with doctors’ smartphones or mobile computers. The hand-held system can identify pathogens responsible for specific healthcare-acquired infections (HAIs) at the point of care within two hours, according to an MGH statement.
The researchers noted that 600,000 patients develop HAIs each year, 10% of which die, and that costs related to HAIs can reach $100 to $150 billion per year. However, as Dark Daily reported, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) does not reimburse hospitals for certain HAIs. (See Dark Daily, “Consumer Reports Ranks Smaller and Non-Teaching Hospitals Highest in Infection Prevention,” October, 30, 2015.) Thus, the critical need to identify from where the infection originated, which generates a significant proportion of samples tested at the clinical laboratories of the nation’s hospitals and health systems.
Therefore, pathologists and medical laboratory scientists will understand that shifting some of that specimen volume to point-of-care testing will change the overall economics of hospital laboratories.
Smartphone-based Genetic Test for HIAs
The MGH research team created a way to do accurate genetic testing in a simple device powered by a system they call Polarization Anisotropy Diagnostics (PAD). The system measures changes in fluorescence anisotropy through a detection probe’s recognition of bacterial nucleic acid, reported Medscape Medical News. More than 35 probes for detecting bacterial species and virulence factors are available.
Optical test cubes are placed on an electronic base station that transmits data to a smartphone or computer, where results are displayed. “In a pilot clinical test, PAD accuracy was comparable to that of bacterial culture. In contrast to the culture, the PAD assay was fast (under two hours), multiplexed, and cost effective (under $2 per assay), wrote the MGH researchers in the journal Science Advances. (more…)
Jul 29, 2016 | Instruments & Equipment, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology, Laboratory Testing
Paper-based devices could perform complex, multistep diagnostic tests at a fraction of the cost of traditional medical laboratory analysis
Many research teams are racing to create paper-based devices for medical laboratory tests. Their primary goal is develop a cheap, fast, reliable way to perform diagnostic testing in third world settings, where modern clinical laboratories are few and far between. One development team is working to combine lab-on-a-chip technologies with the low cost of paper-based platforms.
Meanwhile, over the past decade, point-of-care testing (POCT) has revolutionized diagnosis and treatment options for a myriad of conditions. In developing regions or remote areas, low-cost POCT improves accessibility to vital tests for infectious diseases, such as HIV, Malaria, and Ebola, as well as acute medical conditions, such as sepsis.
In the past eight years, Dark Daily has reported many times on the emergence of new POCT devices. From lactic acid screening to the lab-in-a-needle, which is used for detecting liver toxicity, the ability to produce a quick and accurate diagnosis without intensive clinical laboratory testing is growing.
However, one area where many POCT devices face challenges is in surviving extended environmental exposure. This does not pose an issue in major research hospitals or health systems. However, the consequences can be severe when considering the often harsh, resource-limited conditions of developing countries—one area in which POCT stands to offer the greatest value. (more…)
