LABORATORY TURN AROUND TIME FOR BIOCHEMISTRY INVESTIGATIONS IN EMERGENCY DEPARTMENT OF A TERTIARY CARE HOSPITAL OF NORTH INDIA

Background: Laboratory turnaround time is considered one of the most important indicators of work efficiency in hospitals, physicians always need timely results to take effective clinical decisions especially in the emergency department where these results can guide physicians whether to admit patients to the hospital, discharge them home or do further investigations. Objectives:1. Calculate the turnaround time for the various biochemical investigations from accident and emergency of a tertiary care institute.2. To find the percentage contribution of pre-analytical, analytical and post analytical phases to TAT. Materials And Methods: This was a prospective, descriptive, single-center study of therapeutic TAT for biochemistry investigations in accident and emergency of a tertiary care hospital. The study was conducted for a period of 3 months from August 2020 to Oct 2020. During the present study period, all biochemistry investigations ordered from emergency department were studied. The Lundberg definition of TAT was used in this study. This means that the pre-analytical TAT used was from the point of order of tests to the receipt of samples at the laboratory. Similarly, the post-analytic phase started from the time results were available at the laboratory to the point where clinicians could access it for action. Results: The turnaround time (TAT) has been monitored in total of 7515 samples for biochemistry evaluation with mean TAT of 169.6 min. It was noted that the mean pre analytical time period was 120.6 min , Analytical time period 34 min while post analytical time period was 15 min. In our study of the pre-analytical phase 37.7%, 39.3%, and 22.9% tests were completed within 60, 60-120 and above 120 minutes, respectively. With respect to the analytical phase, 80.4% and 19.6% tests were completed below 45 minutes and above 45 minutes, respectively. Conclusion: Despite efficient analysis of results, the pre analytic period contributed the most delay in TAT. Collecting the blood samples under standard conditions, filling the test request slips, marking the samples with bar-codes contributed to long TAT.