The One Dorset pathology network is up and running with its new CliniSys laboratory information system following a go-live at all three of its laboratories.
The WinPath Enterprise implementation included the first deployment of the CliniSys Specimen Processing module, a cloud-based system that can be used to track tissue samples and slides through the testing process.
The One Dorset deployment approach will now be used as the model for a wider roll-out to Southern Counties Pathology, which serves six neighbouring trusts in the south of England.
Stephen Harding, head of service at One Dorset Pathology, paid tribute to staff who worked with CliniSys to configure the LIMS for the network while coping with the demands of the Covid-19 pandemic.
“It was a big job that had to be done in addition to the day job while dealing with Covid-19; but it meant the go-live went really well. Now, we are in a better position to support each other as a network and to keep delivering the great service that we want for clinicians and patients.” Said Harding.
One Dorset Pathology announced in February 2020 that it would deploy WinPath Enterprise and integrate it with the CliniSys Integrated Clinical Environment (ICE) to make it easier for hospital clinicians and GPs to order tests and access the results, wherever they are conducted.
The go-live delivered this for the network’s laboratories in Poole, Bournemouth and Dorchester. The development should mean fewer tests for patients and more information for clinicians who need to make diagnoses and treatment decisions.
“Previously, a patient might have a test at one site and then go to another, which would have no record of the result,” Harding explained. “Now, clinicians in pathology can see results of tests wherever they are conducted. That means they might not need to run the test again or they will be able to look at a series of results and find trends.”
The WinPath Enterprise go-live will also lay the groundwork for developments to the pathology network, which is the first in the country to implement the CliniSys Specimen Processing module.
The module is the first CliniSys IT system to be hosted on Microsoft Azure, and it has been designed to support all pathology disciplines, but initially cellular pathology, by making it easier to track sample pots, blocks, and slides.
Specimen Processing will also be integrated with a new scanner in Bournemouth that will turn the glass slides that are viewed through a microscope into digital images that can be studied on a computer screen.
Digital pathology will help the network to make the best use of scarce specialists, by making it easier for them to access and report on the digital slides, wherever they are based.
Meanwhile, the deployment of WinPath Enterprise in Dorset is going to be used as the basis for a roll-out to the five other trusts in Southern Counties Pathology that signed a contract for the LIMS last March.