{"id":1772,"date":"2015-12-28T08:04:15","date_gmt":"2015-12-28T16:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/?p=1772"},"modified":"2015-12-18T15:09:14","modified_gmt":"2015-12-18T23:09:14","slug":"patient-safety-in-office-practice-test-result-management","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/?p=1772","title":{"rendered":"Patient Safety in Office Practice &#8211; Test Result Management"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Primary care physicians order a lot of tests \u2013 to diagnose complaints, to monitor chronic diseases, to check medication levels, to screen for health risks and early disease.<!--more--> A survey of over 1700 physicians in 2013 suggested that 31.4% of encounters resulted in a laboratory order. The same survey suggested that 15% of the time, the physician was uncertain as to what to order. On receiving results, nearly 10% of results were difficult to interpret. 6% of all office visits have a missing laboratory. Studies have found that up to 54% of errors in the primary care office are related to the testing process.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/ml3zltbr0lxh.i.optimole.com\/w:auto\/h:auto\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/test-process-6.jpg\"><img data-opt-id=1911935934  fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"  wp-image-1773 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/ml3zltbr0lxh.i.optimole.com\/w:300\/h:169\/q:mauto\/ig:avif\/https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/12\/test-process-6.jpg\" alt=\"test process 6\" width=\"348\" height=\"202\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>This process model suggests that laboratory test errors can result from:<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li>Uncertainty about which test to order<\/li>\n<li>Performance of the test in the lab<\/li>\n<li>Tracking of results in the office<\/li>\n<li>Timely and appropriate response to test results<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>What are strategies in office practice that can minimize test result errors, and protect your patient from failures in the system? Dr. Nancy Elder, a family physician who has conducted extensive research in office based patient safety, has promoted a set of organization safety measures for better managing test results in office practice.<\/p>\n<ol>\n<li><strong>Identify specific staff members<\/strong> to manage the receipt and filing\/processing of laboratory results<\/li>\n<li><strong>Develop relationships with your clinical pathologist.<\/strong> Consult them for any ordering question.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Develop protocol for results management<\/strong> including ordering process, review by whom and by when, tracking and monitoring results, and communication of results to patients<\/li>\n<li><strong>Specific protocols written for laboratory test ordering, and design into order sets for your HER<\/strong><\/li>\n<li><strong>Standardize correspondence with patients<\/strong>&#8211; what requires phone call, what is written.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>NEXT BLOG:<\/strong> infection prevention in office settings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Primary care physicians order a lot of tests \u2013 to diagnose complaints, to monitor chronic diseases, to check medication levels, to screen for health risks and early disease.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1772","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1772","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1772"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1772\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1774,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1772\/revisions\/1774"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1772"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1772"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/phcprimarycare.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1772"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}