A real-time dashboard for managing pathology processes

Introduction

The practice of anatomical pathology is changing as a result of the introduction of new tests, services, and technologies, as well as the emergence of personalized medicine that asks for targeted pathological diagnoses. The need for real-time monitoring in pathology can be addressed by systems providing graphical dashboards that integrate key performance indicators (KPIs).

Stakeholder requirements

stakeholder

Development approach

DPLM steps

1. accessioning of cases
2. grossing of specimens
3. blocks are sent to the Histology Laboratory
4. dispatch
   • finished slides are checked to ensure that they are matched with the correct specimen and case
   • organized by case and assigned to pathologist
5. pathologists receive complete cases to examine

PowerJ

• closely followed the pathology process at the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine (DPLM)
• the resulting dashboard was implemented on the computers of the Chief of the Division, the Operations Manager, and the Director of Informatics
• evaluated for 3 months starting on November 1, 2014
• the average turnaround time to process specimens decreased by 13%

first dashboard prototype (PowerJ)

Business intelligence (BI)

• implemented using a commercial BI tool
• the Chief of the Division, the Director of Informatics, and the Operations Manager were interviewed
• identification of dashboard objectives
• a case-level dashboard was then developed
• being implemented for managing day-to-day operations

second dashboard layout

Impact of dashboard

Chief of the DPLM consulted the dashboard every morning to get a better picture of the state in which operations of the DPLM were; helping the DPLM to improve its turnaround time. Also, the number of pending cases and the number of uncut blocks decreased significantly.

The use of the dashboard also helped DPLM managers to uncover and address bottlenecks in case processing. Additionally, the component showing pending versus grossed cases enabled the Operations Manager to improve the scheduling of the pathologist assistants working in the Grossing Laboratory.

Related work and solutions

matrix

Conclusion

The pathology dashboard developed for the DPLM at TOH includes graphical components that help clinical and operations managers to monitor and improve the performance of the DPLM. Dynamic, real-time dashboards such as the one discussed in this paper provide pathology managers with a powerful means to identify bottlenecks and analyze data related to exceptions to identify the root causes of the delays in processing.

Article URL

http://www.jpathinformatics.org/article.asp?issn=2153-3539;year=2016;volume=7;issue=1;spage=24;epage=24;aulast=Halwani

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