LIMS Replacement

The migration from a legacy pathology system to CSC’s Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) at UHL was necessary to address serious shortcomings of the legacy system and provide a robust solution capable of supporting the Trust’s strategic IM&T plans including the rollout of Order Communications.
 
Addressing Clinical Risks 
The new system addresses all the clinical risks identified in the original business case including:

1. Electronic HL7 results over the hospital network in real-time
2. Electronic results to GP’s within 1 hour of authorisation
3. Specimen tracking, full audit trails and the ability to record multiple user opinions
4. Comprehensive statistical reporting capability including a full SQL schema
5. Individual pathologist authorisation queues

 
In addition to these benefits the system also provides:

1. Improved data quality through NNN tracing and data matching to PAS
2. Standard SNOMED v3 clinical terms
3. User definable data entry short cuts such as predefined proformas
4. Barcoding opportunities across the system to reduce errors and improve workflow
5. Comprehensive statistical reporting capability

“The change of Lab IT system at Lewisham was resisted by pathology staff who were familiar with the old system but the iBHC Consultant moved into the lab and slowly managed to build support for the new system. We are now doing things we could never dream of doing on the old system.”
Melissa Sargent
IT Systems Administrator, UHL