Decision Support from a Reference Laboratory Perspective

Abstract

Esoteric testing presents a broad range of opportunities to improve clinical decision making. To be effective, the knowledge support needs to be seamlessly embedded into clinical workflows. Reference laboratories are uniquely positioned to play an outsized role in laboratory decision support, in part because they are large repositories of esoteric testing knowledge and in part because of their resources and client relationships. To accomplish this, however, reference laboratories must develop strong capabilities to integrate content and logic into clinical software platforms, including but not limited to electronic health records.

Keywords: Decision support; Esoteric testing; Information display; Reference laboratories.