MSACL 2023 Abstract

Data Automation: From Crawling to Running

Dustin Bunch (1), Daniel Holmes (2), Patrick Mathias (3)
(1) Nationwide Children's Hospital, (2) St Paul's Hospital, (3) University of Washington

Dustin Bunch, PhD, DABCC (Presenter) Nationwide Children's Hospital

Presenter Bio: Dustin R. Bunch, is an Asst. Director of Clinical Chemistry & Co-Director Laboratory Informatics at Nationwide Children's Hospital. His research focuses small molecule analysis by mass spectrometry in a clinical setting and clinical informatics.

Relevant Financial Disclosures (within past 24 months, reported on Feb 13, 2024) No relevant financial relationship(s) to disclose. Discussing Products? NO, presenter will NOT present educational content related to products/services of the ineligible company(ies) listed above. Conflict mitigation NOT REQUIRED.

Daniel Holmes, MD, FRCPC (Presenter) St. Paul’s Hospital

Presenter Bio: Daniel Holmes did his undergraduate training in Chemistry and Physics at the University of Toronto before deciding to pursue medicine as a career. He attended medical school at the University of British Columbia where pathology became his area of major interest. The strong influence of his academic mentors led him to enter the Medical Biochemistry residency training program at UBC. This allowed him to use his background knowledge of chemistry in application to medicine. Areas of clinical interest are diagnostic lipidology/endocrinology and research interests are in the utilization of mathematics and computer diagnostics to laboratory medicine.

Relevant Financial Disclosures (within past 24 months) Not yet reported.

Patrick Mathias, MD, PhD (Presenter) University of Washington

Presenter Bio: Patrick Mathias, M.D., Ph.D., is a board-certified clinical pathologist and Associate Director of Informatics for UW Laboratory Medicine. Lab medicine has large impact on the general practice of medicine. It is key to correctly diagnosing diseases and selecting the right treatments for patients. Dr. Mathias's goal is to combine technical and medical knowledge to fulfill the triple aim--reduce the per capita cost of health care, improve the health of populations and most importantly improve the patient experience of care. Dr. Mathias earned his M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Illinois. His clinical and research interests include clinical informatics, clinical chemistry and molecular diagnostics.

Relevant Financial Disclosures (within past 24 months) Not yet reported.

LEVEL: BEGINNER

Many laboratories have instruments that are not integrated into the laboratory interface structure and require manual movement of data. Examples include mass spectrometers, flow cytometers, thermocyclers of various types, and DNA sequencers. During this session, we will discuss options and mechanisms for moving data from instrument to instrument, instrument to LIS, and LIS to instrument. Each of our labs have created data integration pipelines for mass spectrometry, flow cytometers, and molecular instruments with various levels of full automation. We will discuss some of the issues and barriers we discovered. Time for group discussion about the types of instruments the attendees want to integrate and possible barriers they will face.

Take Home Pearls:
1. In most cases, there is a solution that will allow the transfer of data among instruments and the LIS, but some are more difficult than other.
2. Sometimes a programmer will be required.
3. Know the security and IT requirements for your institution.