Laboratory Staff Turnover: A College of American Pathologists Q-Probes Study of 23 Clinical Laboratories.

CONTEXT.­: Knowledge of laboratory staff turnover rates are important to laboratory medical directors and hospital administrators who are responsible for ensuring adequate staffing of their clinical laboratories. The current turnover rates for laboratory employees are unknown. OBJECTIVE.­: To determine the 3-year average employee turnover rates for clinical laboratory staff and to survey the types of institutional human resource practices that may be associated with lower turnover rates. DESIGN.­: We collected data from participating laboratories spanning a 3-year period of 2015-2017, which included the number of full-time equivalent (FTE) staff members that their laboratories employed in several personnel and departmental categories, and the number of laboratory staff FTEs who vacated each of those categories that institutions intended to refill. We calculated the 3-year average turnover rates for all laboratory employees, for several personnel categories, and for major laboratory departmental categories, and assessed the potential associations between 3-year average all laboratory staff turnover rates with institutional human resource practices. RESULTS.­: A total of 23 (20 US and 3 international) participating institutions were included in the analysis. Among the 21 participants providing adequate turnover data, the median of the 3-year average turnover rate for all laboratory staff was 16.2%. Among personnel categories, ancillary staff had the lowest median (11.1% among 21 institutions) and phlebotomist staff had the highest median (24.9% among 20 institutions) of the 3-year average turnover rates. Among laboratory departments, microbiology had the lowest median (7.8% among 18 institutions) and anatomic pathology had the highest median (14.3% among 14 institutions) of the 3-year average turnover rates. Laboratories that developed and communicated clear career paths to their employees and that funded external laboratory continuing education activities had significantly lower 3-year average turnover rates than laboratories that did not implement these strategies. CONCLUSIONS.­: Laboratory staff turnover rates among institutions varied widely. Two human resource practices were associated with lower laboratory staff turnover rates.

Laboratorio de diagnóstico clínico y/o de vigilancia epidemiológica: norma técnica No. 22-2019-DRACES / Laboratory for clinical diagnosis and / or epidemiological surveillance: technical standard No. 22-2019-DRACES

La tinta del documento está bastante opaca. DRACES [Departamento de Regulación, Acreditación y Control de Establecimientos de Salud] Este documento tiene como objeto: "la regulación, autorización y control de los laboratorios de diagnóstico clínico y/o de vigilancia epidemiológica, en concordancia con el Reglamento para la Regulación, Autorización, Acreditación y Control de Establecimientos de Atención para la Salud, Acuerdo Gubernativo 376-2007." Es de carácter obligatorio, por lo que se aplica tanto al sector público, privado, social o subsector de la seguridad social, en todo el territorio nacional. Contiene además, las definiciones de los conceptos relacionados al tema principal, además de la infraestructura que deberá tener cada clínica, incluidos el equipo y recurso humano y técnico. En el capítulo II, incluye una clasificación del nivel de laboratorios, describiendo sus características, servicios, horarios, materiales técnicos y equipos.

Strengthening national laboratory health systems in the Caribbean Region.

The President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR) programme for the Caribbean Region was established in 2008 to address health system challenges, including fragile laboratory services and systems. The laboratory component of this programme consisted of several phases: assessment of laboratory needs of all 12 countries engaged in the programme; addressing gaps identified during the assessment; and monitoring and evaluation of the progress achieved. After one year of PEPFAR collaboration with national governments and other partners, laboratory services and systems greatly improved. Some of the milestones include: (1) the accreditation of a public laboratory; (2) improved access to HIV diagnosis with faster turnaround time; (3) establishment of capacity for platforms for DNA PCR, viral load and HIV drug resistance; (4) development of the laboratory workforce; and (5) establishment of a framework for implementation of sustainable quality management systems for laboratory accreditation. The progress recorded in strengthening laboratory health systems after one year of initiating this collaboration shows that with a rigorous initial assessment, programme design and intervention and strategic partnership, national laboratory health systems can be greatly enhanced to support programme implementation. Continued collaboration and country leadership is critical to create an integrated and sustainable laboratory network in the Caribbean.

The quality of medical laboratory practice in Trinidad and Tobago, West Indies.

The introduction of automated chemical analyzers in the laboratory service has the potential of adversely affecting professionalism in laboratory practice. The present study assesses the quality of medical laboratory technicians in Trinidad and Tobago using structured questionnaires. Some of the critical questions included job status, years of experience, training, qualification(s) and knowledge of quality assurance and its application. About 82% of laboratory technicians responded to the study. The majority of technicians (62%) had diploma certificates while only one (1.2%) had a postgraduate degree. Although the majority (91.7%) of technicians knew about quality assurance, 36% learnt on the job and 59% knew they were not professionally trained. The results showed that there is paucity of highly trained laboratory technicians in Trinidad and Tobago and this has significant implications on the technical initiative and quality of medical laboratory practice in this country. We recommend the establishment of appropriate professional institutions for training medical laboratory technologists and regular expert inspection and accreditation of all medical laboratories in the country.

Progress in clinical laboratories.

Conventional wisdom perceives progress in the clinical laboratory as a wider menu of available tests and technologies. In this review, we analyze a different concept of progress and propose the following actions: better communication with clinicians, quality control, containment of costs, continuing education and interrelation among laboratories, critical evaluation of emerging technologies, review of work safety, and implementation and/or review of regulations. In the future, clinical laboratories will have to offer quality tests, useful information, and low costs.