Laura S vacation:

Laura S will be on vacation next week and part of the next.

Moses will be acting Tech 2 during this time. Bring any concerns to his attention.

Moses will be checking the inventory on Wednesday to make sure nothing needs to be ordered. In the meantime, if you notice anything getting low please let him know.

Veronica:

Veronica will be starting in microbiology next week.

She will be training on the specimen receiving bench with Vivian for 1 week and then will be on her own the next week.

Supplies locations:

Laura S made a diagram of the core lab fridge and back storage room shelves with all the supplies that are in these areas to help people find what they are looking for.

These will be posted on the specimen fridge, above the low inventory sheet.

Replacing supplies:

If you use the last of something please replace it with a new one. There have been occasions where empty packages were put back in the container. This is frustrating for the technologist going to use these products.

Strep. Latex kit:

According to the kit instructions, we do not need to have pure culture to use the latex. It can be mixed with other flora. Only if you get a negative result and it looks like beta strep do you need to make a purity plate.

We will be switching kits and the new kit is the same way. You can use mixed cultures.

Denim blue plates:

Denim blue plates only need to be incubated for 18-24hrs. Laura S had LIS change the observation comment to “No denim blue colonies seen after 18-24hrs” instead of saying “No blues after full 24hrs incubation”

Continue to write the time you are incubating the plates on them.

Vitek Maintenance:

We will start doing the Vitek maintenance as part of the daily start up instead of leaving it for the urine person to do later on. This way it is done and over with.

Cancellation comments:

Laura S made a job aid with all our rejection reasons and the codes that are used in the LIS.

You just need to order the test and save and then go back in to order entry and hit cancel order. Then used the canned message that corresponds to why you cancelled it.

This job aid will be kept at the front computer. It will be laminated once we are sure no changes need to be made.

Laura S also made a job aid for referred out tests with the test codes to use. This will also be kept at the front and laminated once no changes need to be made.

MLA not receiving specimens:

It was brought to our attention that sometimes the core lab MLA does not receive the specimens that are received already labelled (Hay River/Fort Smith). Then if we do not check in here the technologist working on the plates the next day will not be able to enter in their results.

It was determined that the core lab MLA are supposed to receive all the specimens that come in already ordered but that sometimes this does not happen.

We decided that we will just make sure that the specimens are received and not just assume they are. This should be apparent if we are using the Not Plated receiving worklist as they will not appear on here if they are not received.

Laura S will make sure to discuss this with the MLA that come into micro so they are aware that they need to check to make sure specimens are received.

Scanning requisitions:

We decided that the 9-5 technologist will scan the requisitions at the end of their shift. This way the 12-8 technologist does not have to worry about it.

Requisitions that have not been scanned will be kept in the brown folder on top of the label printer. Once they are scanned, they will be filed above the computer to be kept for a month.

New binders:

Laura has revised the Microbiology Orientation Binder and the Specimen Processing Binder.

These are both kept at the front bench.

Jennifer is still approving these procedures but copies are in the binder for now.

Send out forms:

Laura S revised the send out procedures, which includes: Category B to Prov lab, Category B to DynaLIFE, Category A to Provlab and Category B to NML.

These are in the new Specimen Processing Binder at the front bench.

There are corresponding binders on the back shelves with all the forms needed for send outs and they are divided by the location.

If anyone has any questions or suggestions please let Laura S know.

Solomon roundtable:

Solomon brought up the issue of people not putting barcodes on Bactec bottles properly and are covering up the bottle barcode and also placing labels on horizontally not vertically.

Laura S will talk to Jennifer and ask her to send out a memo reminding people not to cover the Bactec barcode and to place labels on bottles properly.