Utilization Management in a Large Community Hospital

The utilization management of laboratory tests in a large community hospital is similar to academic and smaller community hospitals. There are numerous factors that influence laboratory utilization. Outside influences like hospitals buying physician practices, increasing numbers of hospitalists, and hospital consolidation will influence the number and complexity of the test menu that will need to be monitored for over and/or under utilization in the central laboratory and reference laboratory. CLIA’88 outlines the four test categories including point-of-care testing (waived) and provider-performed microscopy that need laboratory test utilization management. Incremental cost analysis is the most efficient method for evaluating utilization reduction cost savings. Economies of scale define reduced unit cost per test as test volume increases. Outreach programs in large community hospitals provide additional laboratory tests from non-patients in physician offices, nursing homes, and other hospitals. Disruptive innovations are changing the present paradigms in clinical diagnostics, like wearable sensors, MALDI-TOF, multiplex infectious disease panels, cell-free DNA, and others. Obsolete tests need to be universally defined and accepted by manufacturers, physicians, laboratories, and hospitals, to eliminate access to their reagents and testing platforms.