POC and EPIC Beaker

Following as we are also transitioning to Beaker.

Following this, as we have also been asked to transition from enter/edit to beaker. 

Following...

We use both enter/edit and BEAKER in POC here.  However, all of our POC BEAKER results are resulted through an interface.  We did this because if we gave staff had ability to enter results into BEAKER, we were told staff would have access to all the BEAKER functions.  This would mean that they could potentially result other lab results.  At the time we implemented BEAKER, we could not restrict access to just POC resulting.  For tests we can't interface (ie: pregnancy testing, Amnisure testing etc) we decided to keep with enter/edit so we would be able to restrict BEAKER access.

 A few of our departments that are smaller do have access to BEAKER for their resulting like our respiratory care department.  We did this for a several reason like allowing the staff to enter communication logs for critical value results.  In BEAKER you have ability to force staff to make communication logs for critical value results or other criteria set by your instituation.  There are also other features that are available as well.  Since BEAKER produces actual lab reports, results are able to be automatically sent to other institutions that are involved in patient care.  You will get a lot more functionality from BEAKER POC resulting than enter/edit.

Because of the inability to restrict access to reporting other lab testing, our organization decided to stick with enter/edit with some of our POC tests.  I have over 2000 POC staff across our organization and giving that many users access to BEAKER seems like a horrible idea.  Your situation might be different.  Hope this helps!

Hi Laura,
We are in the first week of Epic Go Live throughout our HealthCare system. I'm the POC Coordinator for over 50 ambulatory clinics that perform POC testing. We are using Enter/Edit for POC testing in the ambulatory clinics. Have you found any way that the clinic staff in the POC labs can print patient labels for the POC testing? I've found that the nursing personnel can print patient labels in the patient care exam rooms when boarding patients, but those that perform the POC test in the lab area cannot print any labels (if the nursing staff haven't given them any) - for example, if the lab personnel collect a capillary sample to perform a HA1C test on an analyzer, they can't print any labels (I assume because there is no "collect specimen" tab available to them). I've asked the Epic Team that's onsite, but would appreciate any insight. Thanks!

We have a similar setup to Laura. Enter/Edit for manual entry and Beaker for interfaced devices, all IGO. Beaker Result Entry is much more robust than Enter/Edit however LD did not want to give over 3000 end-users access to Beaker which I agree with. Beaker will let you manipulate the resulting more, ie, reflex testing, comments, rules, etc. Enter/Edit is more barebones, you can either have a free text field or the user picks from a list, you can have a hard stop.. and that's about it. Adding components for material lots and exp dates help with documentation but again, barebones. If other places use E/E better please let me know!

@Briggit are you referring to Beaker labels or CSN/encounter labels?  For Beaker labels, once nurses release an order they should be able to collect specimen and print the Beaker label. However, specimens can be tagged as "lab collect" or "clinic collect", if tagged as lab collect then then nurses will not be able to print. For CSN labels, they should have permissions to print for the active encounter. 

@Stephen the ambulatory POC clinics do not use Beaker. Beaker is used at the clinical lab location in the hospital. If the nurses collect a sample, yes, they can print a label, but if it's a POC test that will go to the POC lab (for example a hgb A1C that's run on a POC analyzer) they cannot print a label unless they print a patient label in the patient exam room - if they don't print the label in the exam room, the POC area staff do not have access to printing a patient label. 

@Briggit; We have not found a way for staff to print labels for POC testing in enter/edit.  Its a limitation of enter/edit.  This is why I try to interface about anything that has the capability.  As long as you are planning on interfacing where results post into BEAKER, your IT team should be able to do your test build where a label prints when an order is released.  Staff will not have to have access to  BEAKER to do this.

We do have some locations that our LIS team has set up to have a face sheet print when they check into an appointment.  Our POC staff can use these facesheets to scan in identification to POC instrumentation.  We have found this helpful at some of our locations. 

Hi everyone, I found this topic because my hospital + outpatient clinics will be transitioning to Beaker for our LIS. We currently have Epic for EMR, Sunquest for LIS, and Telcor QML for POC Middleware. Does anyone have any words of advice or guidance for us that have went through this transition to Beaker LIS? Are you able to have Rover in your outpatient clinics for specimen collection? Are there things you aren't able to do with Beaker? Or things it doesn't do well? We interface most POC devices (unsolicited orders/IGO) but use Enter/Edit in Epic to manually report POCTs like strep A and pregnancy. Are there certain builds you have in your Beaker LIS that you love?   Thank you!

Following as we are transitioning from Soft to Beaker. We have Telcor set up with WebMRE for entering in manual test results. This helps to keep staff locked out if their competency is not current. 

With the switch to Beaker are staff not able to continue to print labels from their side of Apex?