Quality of the clinical laboratory department in a specialized hospital in Alexandria, Egypt

Assessment and improvement of turnaround times (TAT) as well as customer satisfaction is essential for laboratory quality management. This study in a specialized hospital in Alexandria, Egypt measured the current TAT for outpatient department bilirubin samples and evaluated the satisfaction of physicians with aspects of clinical laboratory services. While the mean TAT for 110 bilirubin tests [58.1 (SD 31.8) min] was within the College of American Pathologists benchmark, the 90th percentile was long (96.7 min); 62.7% of tests were reported within 60 min. The mean overall satisfaction score of physicians (range 1–5) was 3.46 (SD 0.49). The highest satisfaction rating was for staff courtesy while the lowest ratings were for laboratory management responsiveness, outpatient stat TAT and critical value notification. Quality or reliability of results was judged by physicians as the most important factor (32.3%), followed by routine test TAT (18.5%). Further analysis of the different steps of the TAT would be helpful and follow-up through examining outliers is recommended.