Reqscan: An open source solution for laboratory requisition scanning, archiving and retrieval.
Requisition storage and retrieval are an integral part of the outpatient laboratory testing process. It is frequently necessary to review an original requisition to confirm the ordering physician, patient demographics, diagnostic information, and requested tests. Manual retrieval of a paper requisition is time-consuming and tedious. Although commercial solutions exist for the scanning and archiving of barcoded paper requisitions, the tools to accomplish this are freely available from the open source software community. We present a simple dedicated piece of software, Reqscan, for scanning patient laboratory requisitions, finding all barcode information, and saving the requisition as a portable document format named according the barcode(s) found. This Python application offers a simple solution to patient requisition digitization. Reqscan has been successfully tested and implemented into routine practice for storage and retrieval of outpatient requisitions at St. Paul's Hospital, Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
Faculty of Arts and Science, University of British Columbia, 2329 West Mall, Vancouver, BC, V6T 1Z4, Canada.
Eviatar
E
Bach
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, St. Paul's Hospital, 1081 Burrard St., Vancouver, BC, V6Z 1Y6, Canada ; Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, University of British Columbia, Rm. G227-2211 Wesbrook Mall, Vancouver, BC, V6T 2B5, Canada.
Daniel T
DT
Holmes
Barcode; digitization; electronic medical record; laboratory; patient record; requisition; scanning