Laboratory Reports For The Physician

Communications with physician-users is a serious problem in clinical laboratory practice today. Its symptoms are cumbersome test request procedures, abuse of stat requests, duplication of test orders, too many phone calls. Most computerized systems ignore these problems. Those that rely on on-line interactive terminals have only exacerbated it. These problems are easily solved by reports printed in the laboratory and delivered on schedule directly to each physician. These reports contain only current information on the patients of direct interest to the addressee, and they satisfy 85% of his need for laboratory information. A system of this kind has been operating continuously in one hospital, and has recently been installed in a second.