Share your experience and help others understand the real-world benefits of following CLSI guidelines. Whether it's improved accuracy, enhanced efficiency, or better compliance, your story can inspire and guide fellow professionals. Submit your experience today and contribute to a global conversation on laboratory excellence!
August 15, 2023
Health Partners: Expanding CLSI Access With Health System Membership
Overview
Jeana Houseman, MHSA, DLM (ASCP) CM, Director of Quality, Patient Safety and Accreditation for Laboratories, at HealthPartners described how this CLSI health system member organization is benefiting from their CLSI membership as they work to unify their protocols across the extensive Health Partners network.
The Situation
HealthPartners is an integrated health care organization based in Minnesota that provides health care services and health plan financing and administration to more than 1.2 million patients in Minnesota and western Wisconsin. It is the largest consumer-governed nonprofit health care organization in the nation. HealthPartners employs over 1800 physicians and a total of 26,000 people. They have 900 laboratory employees and over 80 testing locations. Health Partners performs around 10 million tests per year, including both routine and specialized tests.
Jeana explained that although all HealthPartners locations had robust quality management systems and quality control, they were mostly operating as separate entities. Their goal? To better unify the system with more standardization and consistency.
The Outcome
After becoming a CLSI Health System member, Health Partners worked to standardize their policies across all site locations. They began by creating common definitions using CLSI documents. Now, Health Partners has written into their document control policy that all teams will use the most up-to-date reference materials available, including regulatory standards, scientific literature, industry guidance, product inserts, and consensus standards.
“This reminds the team that every time they’re looking at a policy or procedure that they should also be referencing back to the current literature in CLSI documents to make sure that we’re following best practices"
Jeana noted that Health Partners has been purposely working on how to make decisions as a system. They could create a risk assessment tool using CLSI’s risk management guidance that defined protocol for examining current processes and related risks, as well as risk associated with change in process.
Submit a Case Study
Share Your Experience with CLSI Standards in your Laboratory
