Setting Up LabPro

LabPro sends lab orders out and brings results back in electronically, so they land on the patient's chart instead of arriving as faxes to be scanned.

Setting it up is mostly account work with the laboratory. The parts inside OfficePro are quick; the parts outside it are not, so start with the lab.

Get an account with each lab

Every laboratory you send to needs its own account, and each is recorded against a provider with the account number the lab issued. If two providers order under separate accounts at the same lab, both are recorded separately.

Get the account numbers right before your first order. A requisition sent under the wrong account is a result that comes back to somebody else.

Set up the demographic bridge

Orders are placed in LabCorp Link rather than in OfficePro. To stop your staff typing every patient twice, OfficePro exposes a demographic bridge that LabCorp Link calls when you search for a patient by MRN or patient ID. It returns the patient's details and your insurance company list.

It authenticates by IP address, so the clinic's public IP has to be registered with us. That is worth arranging before your first order rather than discovering at the counter - and worth revisiting whenever your internet connection or office moves, because a changed IP silently stops the lookup working.

Specimen collection arrangements - whether patients go to a draw centre or you draw in-clinic, and the supplies and courier that go with it - are agreed with the lab directly.

Check how results will come back

Results arrive electronically and attach themselves to the patient. That matching depends on the demographics you send matching what the lab returns, so before you rely on it:

• Place one real order in LabCorp Link, using the patient search, and follow it through to a result on their chart in OfficePro.
• Confirm the result appears under Lab Reports on that patient, not only in the practice-wide list.
• Agree with the lab who to call when something does not arrive, and keep that number somewhere your front desk can find it.

Plan to check for unassigned results from the start. Some results will arrive that cannot be matched to a patient automatically - a name spelt differently, a date of birth keyed wrong at the lab. They do not appear on any chart and nothing chases them. Make reviewing them somebody's weekly job before the backlog exists rather than after.

Fullscript labs

Labs ordered through Fullscript come back separately, under Fullscript Labs. That needs Fullscript provider setup - each ordering practitioner mapped to a provider in OfficePro - or results arrive with nobody to route them to.

Where you will work

The LabPro home page carries Process Labs for results waiting to be dealt with, LabPro Lab Reports for everything received, and Stats for this Week.