Michelle, I had the same problem at another lab. We simply went through and
entered all old cases into the computer so we didn't have to look them up.
It took about two years of part time work to do that but after it was over
it was well worth it.

If the cards are typed you may be able to scan them in and do OCR to pick up
the info. Another method is to simply put in the medical record number, or
whatever identifier you use, and then you at least know whether the patient
is in the records or not. We also went through and microfilmed all past
reports and cataloged them by medical record number and surgical number.

Tim Morken
Atlanta


-----Original Message-----
From: Fuller, Michelle [mailto:mfuller@acmlab.com]
Sent: Monday, February 19, 2001 12:53 PM
To: histonet@pathology.swmed.edu
Subject: Patient history cards


Hello Everyone-

We have been live on our computer system since 1995.  Daily, for every
surgical case that we receive in the lab, we have to look in three
different card files (due to the fact that we have merged with 2 other
hospitals) to see if that patient has any previous history cards. (We
average about 80-90 cases a day.)  Some of our Pathologist feel that it
is very important to have this available to them, others do not even
look for past history.  In an effort to streamline our workflow, we are
interested in how other facilities handle this.  

Thanks in advance for any information.

Michelle Fuller
Histology Supervisor
ACM Medical Laboratory, Inc.
Rochester, NY 14624

e-mail mfuller@acmlab.com