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Speeding Toward Real
Time with POC Glucoses
CAP Today, March 2008, Feature
Article
In the case of
wireless setups for point-of-care glucose testing,
do results arrive in the electronic medical record
in real time or "real time"? And how important is
that distinction?
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back up a moment: As reported in the
October 2007
issue of CAP TODAY ("Wireless Glucose Results-The
Latest in Real-Time Data"), the University of North
Carolina Hospitals, Chapel Hill, has implemented LifeScan's OneTouch DataLink system to greatly
shorten the length of time it takes to obtain, view,
and track point-of-care blood glucose results on
clinical workstations, laboratory IT systems, and
even physicians' PDAs. Other institutions are
gradually following suit.
The LifeScan system
speeds glucose result delivery by using a wireless
unit to transmit data from LifeScan's OneTouch
Flexx meter into the electronic medical record
rather than requiring point-of-care staff to take
the meter to a docking station for upload. Here's
what some consider the sticking point: The wireless
unit is external, meaning the user must connect it
to the meter with a serial cable before connectivity
can be established. True, the LifeScan wireless unit
is stored in the same carrying tote that holds the
meter. But it's still an external solution.
"It's not real-time
wireless," says James H. Nichols, PhD, DABCC, FACB,
who, as a member of the Connectivity Industry
Consortium, helped create the POCT1-A connectivity
standard for point-of-care devices in 2001.
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Dr.
Nichols is medical director of chemistry at Baystate
Health, Springfield, Mass., and associate professor
of pathology at Tufts University School of Medicine,
Boston. "It's a stepping stone on the way to real
time, but it's not there yet. It's not like you have
the device in your hand, you push the button to scan
the patient, and it communicates wirelessly with
your server. It still has that limitation of
intermittent transmitting."
Click here for more >
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POC Glucose Benchmarking Report includes Nearly 19 Million
Results
Medical
Automation Systems has released a POC Glucose Benchmarking
Report providing mean blood glucose results of more than 170
hospitals during the year 2007. This
report includes over 18.7 million blood glucose test
results, of which approximately 4.6 million came from the
ICU and approximately 14.1 million from the non-ICU nursing
units.
If you
would like to participate in the RALS-Annual Report,
click here. |
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Integrating POCT In the ED
POC Connectivity Concepts,
Advance for the Administrators of the Lab, Vol. 17 •Issue 2
• Page 9
By
Valerie L. Ng, PhD, MD; R. Clayton Hooper, RN; Ruth
Pfeiffer, RN; Mary N. Clancy, MS, CLS; and Eberhard Fiebig,
MD
You can't get much more
diametrically opposed cultures than that of the ED and the
laboratory. The laboratory culture is one of careful and
methodical processes and quality systems designed to ensure
high-quality results and meet regulatory requirements. The
ED culture is one of speed, algorithmic medical practice and
rapid reflexive actions necessary to save lives in
emergencies; regulatory compliance tasks are often an
afterthought.
Ironically, many ED
interventions rely on accurate laboratory test results.
Point-of-care testing (POCT) results in the ED must, by
definition, be of the highest quality and always correct
because clinical action will be taken immediately based on
the test result.
Why has POCT become so important
for the ED? The backdrop is the unraveling of the healthcare
system, driving many uninsured and sick patients without
primary care access to the ED for routine or urgent (but not
emergency) medical care.
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