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Bob Janes, clinical lab specialist in the chemistry core lab at The Nebraska Medical Center, demonstrates the new Beckman Coulter 880. |
The majority of chemistry and immunochemistry tests are currently evaluated with technology that is outdated and will soon be obsolete.
The lab’s new state of the art system will improve performance. As part of this implementation, the laboratory will install an automated front-end processing unit as the initial step toward full automation of the chemistry line.
The vendor selected to provide the new equipment, because of their high ranking in all of the above categories, was Beckman Coulter. The new analyzers include two Beckman Coulter 880s — each composed of a DxC 800 & a DxI 800 connected with a closed tube sampler — and one Beckman Coulter DxC 800. This new instrumentation will allow lab staff to consolidate testing from 10 instruments down to just a few and will run more than 100 different assays for the institution.
“These instruments are real workhorses that will allow us to better adapt to our ever-increasing testing volume,” said Kathy Salerno, manager of the lab.
Additional long-term benefits of the new instrumentation include decreased sample volume, decreased errors, process flow improvement and enhanced test availability.
As a result of the new instrumentation, the Core Laboratory will standardize blood collection tube types to maximize efficiency of the front-end processor unit.
To assist hospital staff transition to these tube standardizations, information will be presented at a variety of meetings, and fliers and reference cards will be provided to all affected staff.