A Common Approach to a Variety of Clinical Laboratories

Summary

This paper describes in outline the Clinical Laboratories computer system operated as part of the overall integrated hospital system at The London Hospital. Computer-based requesting services which relate directly to the bedstate and hence admissions System, are well — established for almost all pathology services. In the last two years laboratory worksheet and associated results capture services have been added for the three major laboratories of Microbiology, Clinical Chemistry and Haematology.

The degree to which the system is basically independent of the laboratory concerned, while at the same time being varied and flexible enough to meet laboratory requirements, is the main topic of the paper. It has proved to be the case that, by the use of two main files into which laboratory and test specific data have been abstracted, a fundamentally common system is operated in the three main laboratories. This is true, not only in the more remote requesting aspects of the system, but also in the laboratory worksheets and associated documentation services used within the laboratories themselves, and it is this aspect in particular that the paper explores.