Laboratory Specimen Errors
Contents in this section
Pre-Initiative Data Unit Staff Meeting
1 on 1 In-service Post-Initiative Data Literature Review Plan for Follow-up
Pre-Initiative Data Unit Staff Meeting
1 on 1 In-service Post-Initiative Data Literature Review Plan for Follow-up
Since noticing the increase in laboratory specimen errors on the MS PCU, I decided to improve the quality of care that we provide our patients on MS PCU and throughout the hospital. Ideally by writing employee numbers on every specimen label that goes to the clinical lab, this would help in the reduction of errors that occur on the unit.
I began by tracking the amount of errors that occurred on the MS PCU that were reported by the clinical lab by way of Safety Intelligence (SI) reports. I looked at the number of errors that we present prior to the initiation of the improvement. This began in June 2013 after the MS PCU opened on AIP.
After I initiated the improvement, I remained keeping track of all SI's that were reported. I kept the staff well informed of the amount of errors during this process.
After a few months of the process change and seeing a slight reduction of specimen errors, I along with the sub-committee laboratory task-force joined forces and developed the orange card that will help in the reduction of extra labels being added to the specimen bag.
I would have liked to have the exact amount of specimens that are processed each month by the clinical lab, but after speaking to Cameron Norris, Director of Clinical Laboratory, he mentioned that it was very time consuming and would not be feasible to do every month. He was able to give me June 2014's number of specimens that were processed and this was well over 5,000. Give the inability to obtain the exact number of specimens sent to the lab, I was just able to track the number of errors that were being reported and this would be my sample size or "n".
I began by tracking the amount of errors that occurred on the MS PCU that were reported by the clinical lab by way of Safety Intelligence (SI) reports. I looked at the number of errors that we present prior to the initiation of the improvement. This began in June 2013 after the MS PCU opened on AIP.
After I initiated the improvement, I remained keeping track of all SI's that were reported. I kept the staff well informed of the amount of errors during this process.
After a few months of the process change and seeing a slight reduction of specimen errors, I along with the sub-committee laboratory task-force joined forces and developed the orange card that will help in the reduction of extra labels being added to the specimen bag.
I would have liked to have the exact amount of specimens that are processed each month by the clinical lab, but after speaking to Cameron Norris, Director of Clinical Laboratory, he mentioned that it was very time consuming and would not be feasible to do every month. He was able to give me June 2014's number of specimens that were processed and this was well over 5,000. Give the inability to obtain the exact number of specimens sent to the lab, I was just able to track the number of errors that were being reported and this would be my sample size or "n".