Abbott Informatics Plays Integral Role in Supporting the Public Health COVID-19 Response
June 12, 2020 – Hollywood, FL.
Abbott Informatics, a division of Abbott, supports comprehensive laboratory data management needs across an organization through their STARLIMS solution product suite. Abbott Informatics’ Laboratory Information Management Systems collects, manages, reports, and interprets lab data rapidly and seamlessly. Specifically, STARLIMS Public Health (PH) LIMS solution automates and streamlines disease testing and reporting, focusing on specimen and test result data management, enabling labs to deliver timely and accurate results, helping to protect the health of entire population. Currently, Abbott Informatics is partnering with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and with more than 30 members of the Association of Public Health Laboratories (APHL), and international public health organizations, to provide real-time lab management functionality while ensuring best practices are achieved and industry standards are exceeded. During the COVID-19 pandemic, STARLIMS PH has enabled CDC and other public health agencies to reduce test turnaround time, eliminate the manual data entry process, and increase the throughput for testing.
Abbott Informatics STARLIMS PH manages and automates several key laboratory processes, from test ordering and batch processing to reporting, by providing a mechanism for digital case management. STARLIMS PH supports electronic test orders through HL7 messaging and automatically inputs specimen data. The system accelerates and automates sample workflows through batch and barcode processes. Further, STARLIMS PH provides real-time results capture by interfacing with clinical laboratory instruments, eliminating the need for and potential errors of manual data entry. STARLIMS PH provides multiple mechanisms for electronic results reporting, including Electronic Laboratory Reporting (ELR).
STARLIMS PH also provides an additional suite of applications essential for laboratory data management. The Events and Case Management applications in STARLIMS PH allows organizations to group, track, and quickly disseminate testing data within organizations, to hospital and clinics, state and local public health agencies, and Federal Government partners. CDC uses STARLIMS Case Management application to collate specimens received for a given case, provide a complete case picture of specimen meta data and testing information, and report out results for individual cases. The Events Management application allows users to assign a collection of specimens to a specific event, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, providing a complete picture across an event to facilitate collaboration between testing labs and analysis and visualization of the data for the event. For the CDC, these applications have allowed the sharing and collaboration on Cases and Events across independent laboratories within CDC, expanding resources and increasing testing capacity. In addition, CDC can selectively share and distribute event data more effectively and in real-time, allowing for a direct, automated connection to the key response system managing the CDC COVID-19 response efforts.
Abbott Informatics has established a COVID-19 dedicated support team, spanning the company’s support, service, and products teams, whose mission is to provide comprehensive and expeditious support to all customer organizations responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. The response team fields requests for support on a myriad of issues including assay configuration, instrument interfaces, and HL7 reporting. The team communicates daily with CDC and members of APHL to meet increased sample volume and demands during the nationwide COVID-19 response. “Rapid, professional response is what defines Abbott Informatics’ commitment to our customers,” commented Mark Spencer, Abbott Informatics’ Divisional Vice President and General Manager. “All of our people across Abbott Informatics have worked tirelessly and with enthusiasm. We are proud that the STARLIMS PH system is helping support the CDC laboratory testing and broader CDC COVID-19 response efforts to protect the nation. We are committed to ensuring STARLIMS PH continues to provide uninterrupted, critical testing support for SARS-CoV-2 and Public Health laboratories world-wide.”
