IBMS Chief Executive David Wells says diagnostic testing is the expert domain of our members, whatever the setting.
The IBMS is becoming increasingly adept at communicating its members’ positions on the issues that affect and matter to them most. We’re also getting better at using our network to enable knowledge sharing at higher levels – making sure that the entire profession is heard through our work.
An example of this occurred late in May, when we launched our new national guidance on point-of-care testing (POCT). It was the outcome of yet another successful collaboration with the Royal College of Pathologists and the Association for Clinical Biochemistry and Laboratory Medicine.
The paper communicates with a new audience, namely those responsible for planning and commissioning novel patient services outside of traditional care settings. It outlines the strategic requirements necessary to adopt POCT where it is needed and how to deliver safe and high-quality POCT within an accreditable framework.
Increasingly, we are seeing diagnostics being flagged as the enabler of innovative, effective, patient-centred care closer to the patient’s home, at the point of need. By setting out the questions that need to be considered, and who the experts are that understand the clinical need, we are placing a marker down and stating that diagnostic testing is the expert domain of our members, whatever the setting.
We explain why it is essential that laboratory experts are used as a source of trusted advice to support the design, assessment, implementation and delivery of diagnostic services outside of the traditional laboratory setting.
We emphasise the need to make sure that the flow of diagnostic information, from where a test is undertaken to the patient record, is visible for all clinical staff who have reason to access it.
We also demonstrate that we need to use our new technologies to create new opportunities and use the existing workforce in more agile ways.
In short, we explain how to ensure our patients have access to the right care at the right time.
I’m confident that the paper will impact at the required level and that, going forward, increasingly appropriate policies will be made around the governance of POCT.
Point of Care Testing: National Strategic Guidance for at Point of Need Testing can be downloaded from the “popular resources” section on our homepage.
David Wells Chief Executive