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Anybody using the Amazing Charts / Quest Diagnostics Lab interface? How are the labs imported? Is discreet data imported or is it a pdf of the lab result? I am currently using Care 360 and labs are automatically printed to paper. Any advice appreciated. Trying to go paperless one step at a time and Quest labs seemed to be a good place to start.
...Ken

We are still pursuing Quest and using Care 360 in the interim. Meanwhile, LabCorp was very responsive and we use their interface. Labs are imported as searchable, discreet data. And guess what...now when I chose a lab, I tend to chose LabCorp. I would start with them.
Now if our Quest rep gets us set-up, I may be happy to recommend their services.

We are using the Quest interface. The reports come across much like the Care360 portal as hl7 files.. you can double click on fields for comments, culture results, comments, etc. and they stay that way in AC, and out of range values are color-coded. You cannot, however, get such things as the "spreadsheet view" of a range of lab tests like you can from Care360, that was handy for, say, comparing kidney functions over time. Once or twice a day I click on "File->import items->lab and x-ray" and it brings the labs directly to the message box of the provider who ordered them. It took my IT guys a little time to work with Quest to get it set up, but has been working fine for over two months with nothing missing so far.

Who paid for the interface?

Quest did. It didnt cost too. much--one-time $250 or $500 fee. Same for Labcorp.

We have Quest on the interface, and intend to do Lab Corp soon. Same as above.

awesome interface
definitely get it

I have PAML and it allows you to not only look at one lab, but if you choose hgba1c and then hit graph it will show you a graphical representation of all hgba1cs for that pt.

You can also when looking at one lab for that pt - hit a button in the upper left which will bring up all labs for that pt - you can then choose one lab like hgba1c and it will bring them up in order on the screen which will let you very carefully analyze a value - could be BUN, Cr, Ratio, NA, K, etc - so you will have to look but I assume all the lab interfaces do the same as this is on AC side.

Quip

Steven, you are correct. I had forgotten that. I was mostly thinking that we had tried to figure out how to import labs from times previous to starting AC. Quest could have pushed forward a year's worth (some 2,000 labs) but we concluded it would have been too much to deal with along with all of our other EHR conversion issues. We had hoped to be able to import a single spreadsheet page from Quest covering all labs for a patient for a year or so without having to go to Care360, printing one for each patient, then importing, but that was not possible. A year or so from now, it will be great just as you say.

I have been using a lab interface for a year or two now and the data is great to be able to review and go over it with a pt. It is too bad you didn't have the time to push that 1 years worth of labs as that would have been great data, but I agree signing off all the labs and such would have been a great deal of work.

Once you get trends in your computer it will be great, just persevere.

Could someone tell me how the lab interface works. Is it a separate software on your computer/server? Does it come directly into AC or does it need to be imported? What are the advantages of a lab interface over electronic fax? Thanks

Working with our local Quest lab, there was a separate program installed on the server. It automatically contacts Quest at specified intervals and "gets" the HL-7 files. Then periodically ( once or twice a day) any one of the providers will go to file ->import/export -> labs and x-rays on the main screen of AC. This grabs the files, and imports them into the inbox of the correct provider. The provider will then select the lab, click "pull labs" form his/her message screen, review it and sign off. We go one step further; we print the lab to the UpDox print interface, and send a copy to the patient portal with explanation. Our patients greatly appreciate this.

David,
Thanks for the input.
What is the advantage of this over just receiving it in Updox to begin with?

Do the values go into a searchable data format or is the intake just a lab report.

If you have a lab interface the values are searchable, whereas with updox or plain importing you are just filing an image. This is how you could search all your diabetic patients with an a1c of over 7 for example.

Yes, exactly. Now, the one minus at the moment is that if you get the lab from Quest and then send it to the UpDox patient portal via the UpDox print interface, your comments are not saved in AC, unless you reimport the lab (meaning it would be in AC twice). If you get the lab as a fax, then comments are saved along with the lab. I have discussed this with Tobin Juday at UpDox, and he said he thought they could put in a "Save to emr" button so the comments would be saved into a file in imported items. That would be the best of both worlds.