Mar 7, 2012 | Laboratory Hiring & Human Resources, Laboratory Management and Operations, Laboratory News, Laboratory Operations, Laboratory Pathology
Clinical laboratory outreach programs gain favor because of many clinical benefits—along with healthy profit margins
In the wake of the severe recession and weak recovery, hospitals across the country recognized they could no longer carry unprofitable programs. That is why, in recent years, a growing number of hospitals reduced or discontinued unprofitable services even as the number of hospital clinical laboratory outreach programs increased.
During this same time, the hospital industry actively expanded into lucrative lines of business, such as clinical laboratory testing. This is an auspicious trend for pathologists and medical laboratories, particularly those who work for hospitals and health systems.
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Feb 3, 2012 | Laboratory News, Laboratory Pathology
Patients are ready to ready access to their medical records; but physicians are wary
Data from two studies here in the United States affirms that patients want access to their health records. Consequently, health systems are increasingly making it easier for patients to get access to prescription lists, medical laboratory test results and now even doctors’ notes.
These findings are important for clinical laboratories and anatomic pathology groups. Laboratory test data typically makes up 70% of the information contained in patient’s health record. The growing interest on the part of patients to have access to their health records creates an opportunity for labs to add value by helping patients have access to their laboratory test results.
Of course, in providing that access, labs must comply with applicable laws governing patient privacy. They must also respect the relationship patients have with referring physicians and how those physicians are themselves allowing patients access to the health records they maintain in their medical practices.
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Jan 30, 2012 | Laboratory News, Laboratory Pathology
Cheaper, faster, and more accurate rapid gene sequencing technologies show great promise in identifying infectious disease agents
In clinical laboratories across the nation, microbiology has greatly benefited from the introduction of molecular diagnostics in clinical practice. Now the field of microbiology is poised to undergo a more profound transformation of clinical practice, due to advances in whole genome sequencing.
Leaders in this field are calling these developments “transformative” and say they have the potential to change “all aspects of microbiology.” The driver to this emerging trend is advanced technology that makes it possible to sequence the whole gene sequence of an organism in a day or less, for a cost that is $1,000 and falling rapidly.
In the past six months, microbiologists and pathologists at such hospitals as Methodist Hospital in Houston, Texas, have begun to do whole genome sequencing of microbes found in specimens collected from patients arriving in the emergency room. The New York Times wrote about these developments in a story titled “The New Generation of Microbe Hunters,” that it published on August 29, 2011.
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Jun 13, 2011 | Laboratory News, Laboratory Pathology
Smartphone-based lab testing device could eliminate need to send biopsies to pathology laboratories
For years, pathologists have wondered when technology would make it feasible to diagnose cancer at the patient’s beside. Eliminating the need for a traditional biopsy that goes off to the anatomic pathology laboratory, and requires 24 hours or more to process the tissue and evaluate the case. Now scientists at Harvard Medical School may be close to perfecting a device that can allow oncologists to do exactly that type of bedside analysis and produce a diagnosis in 60 minutes or less!
The heart of this technology is a new microchip that interacts with smartphone software. Researchers believe it will be possible for physicians to diagnose cancer at the bedside in less than 60 minutes.
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Jul 7, 2008 | Laboratory News, Laboratory Pathology
Microbiologists and hospital infection control teams are intensifying efforts to identify and control infections of antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria. Now comes news of a new tool that can provide another way to control such infections.
Timothy Lu, a Harvard Medical School student and Massachusetts Institute of Technology Ph.D. recipient, has found a way to use bacteriophage-viruses that infect bacteria cells but not human ones-to boost the effectiveness of antibiotics. This development could prove instrumental to conquering the problem of antibiotic-resistant drugs, such as methacillin-resistant Staphylococus aureas, which causes 94,000 cases of life-threatening infections among hospital patients each year.
Lu has engineered bacteriophage to cut through biofilm-the slick, protective coating that covers bacteria-and to seek out the gene mutations that create antibiotic resistance. The bacteriophage then destroy the resistance mechanisms, enabling antibiotic drugs to perform better. The combination of engineered bacteriophage and antibiotics have the potential to eliminate nearly 30,000 times more bacteria than antibiotics alone.
Lu received the Lemelson-MIT Student Prize of $30,000 for inventing the bacteriophage platform. He is developing a secondary use of the platform that would allow bacteriophage to kill off deadly biofilms that attach themselves to food processing equipment and medical instruments.
The success of Lu’s invention could spell out a much better prognosis for patients who are discovered to have methacillin-resistant Staphylococus aureas (MRSA) based on confirmation by hospital-based laboratory tests. Laboratories always welcome medical advancements that make a positive result from a laboratory test less devastating/life-threatening to patients. Lu’s new technology may have applications in the treatment of numerous other superbugs and antibiotic-resistant bacteria strains.
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