Turnaround time improvement and department-wide benefits of automation in urinalysis.

A retrospective study was done pre- and post-implementation of the iQ200 Automated Urinalysis System (composed of the iQ200 Automated Urine Microscopy Analyzer and the Arkray AUTION MAX AX-4280, Iris Diagnostics) to evaluate its impact on process improvement. Routinely-collected turnaround time (TAT) data was evaluated. While some pre-analytical steps were reassigned to non-technical staff post-implementation to better match skills to tasks, a considerable improvement in TAT was seen. TAT was measured as time from "order to result" and noted as the percentage of reports available at 30, 45, and 60 minutes. Post-implementation improvements for urinalysis showed a 30 percent increase in availability of reports at 30 minutes, 9 percent improvement at 45 minutes, and 3.2 percent improvement at 60 minutes. The urinalysis staff also handled hematology duties. Post-implementation, a 44 percent improvement for CBCs was noted in the 30-minute TAT, 22 percent improvement at 45 minutes, and 8 percent improvement at 60 minutes. Laboratory staff were able to complete urinalysis testing more quickly and therefore attend to CBCs sooner, resulting in improved TAT for both tests. These improvements were sustained for at least seven months post-implementation.