[Histonet] Specimen tracking scenario, accountability

[Morken, Timothy]

Curt, You can make and use barcodes in MS Excel or Access and print labels. If you keep the clients items together in some kind of bag or container you can put the label on the outside and scan at each station to track them. You just need to be sure the items are all kept together to ensure nothing gets lost. A photo now and then at critical steps could be helpful (we still take pics of all racks going into our processors - trying to scan cassette barcodes in racks is difficult). 

https://www.smartsheet.com/content/excel-barcodes

Tim Morken
Supervisor, Electron Microscopy/Neuromuscular Special Studies
Department of Pathology
UC San Francisco Medical Center


-----Original Message-----
From: Curt Tague via Histonet <histonet at lists.utsouthwestern.edu> 
Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 2021 9:14 AM
To: histonet at lists.utsouthwestern.edu
Subject: [Histonet] Specimen tracking scenario, accountability

So we're in a reference lab setting here, it's a little different than the hospital environment... I've been in both.

We receive specimens from a variety of different hospitals, physician offices and even other labs for histology (TC), we send the slides back. What I'd like to do is implement some system for tracking blocks throughout the process but with so many different clients and number systems/prefixes, most of which are NOT barcoded, it can be a challenge tracking the blocks throughout the whole process... from receipt to embedding to microtomy...
Aside from manually documenting every blocks on a paper log sheet, would anyone have any suggestions on how to track these things?

My initial thought is a simple digital photo of the basket at embedding (when removed from the processor) then another photo of blocks you take to your microtome and perhaps one last photo when blocks are taken from your cutting station to be filed or returned... the simple issue is tracking who is in possession of what blocks at all times... accountability... but this seems to present challenges too...

Any thoughts are appreciated.

Curt
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