title: Efficiency of an automated reception and turnaround time management system for the phlebotomy room.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Recent advances in laboratory information systems have largely been focused on automation. However, the phlebotomy services have not been completely automated. To address this issue, we introduced an automated reception and turnaround time (TAT) management system, for the first time in Korea, whereby the patient's information is transmitted directly to the actual phlebotomy site and the TAT for each phlebotomy step can be monitored at a glance.
  
  
  METHODS
  The GNT5 system (Energium Co., Ltd., Korea) was installed in June 2013. The automated reception and TAT management system has been in operation since February 2014. Integration of the automated reception machine with the GNT5 allowed for direct transmission of laboratory order information to the GNT5 without involving any manual reception step. We used the mean TAT from reception to actual phlebotomy as the parameter for evaluating the efficiency of our system.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Mean TAT decreased from 5:45 min to 2:42 min after operationalization of the system. The mean number of patients in queue decreased from 2.9 to 1.0. Further, the number of cases taking more than five minutes from reception to phlebotomy, defined as the defect rate, decreased from 20.1% to 9.7%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The use of automated reception and TAT management system was associated with a decrease of overall TAT and an improved workflow at the phlebotomy room.
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Korea.|Department of Laboratory Medicine, Kangwon National University School of Medicine, Chuncheon, Korea.
authors.forename: Soon Gyu
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Yun
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Korea. jwshin@schmc.ac.kr.
authors.forename: Jeong Won
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Shin
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Eun Su
authors.initials: ES
authors.lastname: Park
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Hae In
authors.initials: HI
authors.lastname: Bang
authors.affiliation: Department of Laboratory Medicine, Soonchunhyang University Hospital, Seoul, Korea.
authors.forename: Jung Gu
authors.initials: JG
authors.lastname: Kang
mesh_terms: D057205:Automation, Laboratory; D017598:Efficiency, Organizational / Q000592:standards*; D018962:Phlebotomy / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D056910:Republic of Korea; D013997:Time Factors; D057188:Workflow
keywords: Automation; GNT5 system; Phlebotomy; Reception; Turnaround time