Developing a Lean Process and Automating Your Clinical Laboratory:Does one Precede the Other?

This workshop will provide an in-depth examination of the steps and resulting benefits associated with adopting “Lean” principles and automation in your laboratory. It will resolve the debate on whether laboratory automation hardware and software is better used for initiating or sustaining a lean laboratory. Case histories will highlight and justify these new organizational and technological approaches for achieving quality, profitability, and growth. At the conclusion of this workshop, attendees will have the knowledge and skill to immediately use these principles in their laboratories.

Learning Objectives:

• Examine current process improvement methods in the context of automation

• Reveal current laboratory automation bottlenecks and technological solutions

• Discuss automation in non-traditional laboratory disciplines and their integration into the core laboratory

• Explanin how the implementation of Lean principles supports laboratory automation.

• Describe how instrumentation and autoverification can lead to higher ROI through increased efficiency and fewer errors.

• Using a case study, describe the outcomes of the implementation of automation and Lean principles.

Session Chair: Steve Friedland

Introduction to Clinical Automation: The Basics

Robin Felder, PhD

See-R.-Felder’s-Presentation-Next-Generation-Laboratory-Automation-Systems

Overview of Lean Principles

Steve Friedland

See-S.-Friedland’s-Presentation-Process-Excellence-and-Lean-Thinking

Selecting Instruments That Work with Automation: Avoiding the Incompatibility             Challenges

William A. Neeley, MD

See-W.-Neeley’s-Presentation-Laboratory-Automation-Instrumentation-and-Autoverification

Planning the Lean Effort Before Investing in Automation and New Facilities

John F. Chapman, Dr. P.H, DABCC, FACB

See-J.-Chapman’s-Presentation-Planning-the-Lean-effort