Letter to the Editor

Extract

RE: CLIN LAB SCI 21(2) DD BECK

July 12, 2008

Dear Fellow Laboratorians:

I commend everyone on an excellent proposal. It is well thought out and the recommendation and levels of practice skills are exactly what this profession needs. I believe the proposed model is a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, I do not see an easy way to implement it without legislative incentives. The proposed recommendations to implement the practice are excellent, but why would anyone change now? Laboratory managers cater to administration and are unable to find the staff they need to fill positions. They are in a fight to get through each day.

Laboratory practitioners are looking at how green the grass is for all the other professions in the hospital and getting out of the laboratory. Administration does not support education needs of the laboratory staff.

There are so many laboratory certification agencies that no one, especially human resources, knows who is credible. This is one area that needs to be fixed before any real changes will occur in the laboratory. One organization should represent the laboratory, and they should support the proposal.

At the critical access hospital where I recently worked, we lost all the BSMTs capable of doing microbiology. Now only MLTs are available. There is a huge workload because the hospital is part of a system and one of the other small hospitals sends their microbiology there. This is a cash cow for the small hospital. Without a legislative mandate to hire…