A Synoptic Reporting System to Monitor Bone Marrow Aspirate and Biopsy Quality

OBJECTIVES: Bone marrow evaluation plays a critical role in the diagnosis, staging, and monitoring of many diseases. Although there are standardized guidelines for assessing bone marrow specimen quality, there is a lack of evidence-based tools to perform such assessments. The objective was to monitor bone marrow sample quality in real time by standardizing the basic components of a synoptic report and incorporating it into a bone marrow report template. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A relational database of bone marrow quality parameters was developed and incorporated into our laboratory information system bone marrow report template, with data entry completed during specimen sign out. Data from multiple reports created within a date range were extracted by Structured Query Language query, and summarized in tabular form. Reports generated from these data were utilized in quality improvement efforts. RESULTS: The synoptic reporting system was routinely used to record the quality of bone marrow specimens from adult patients. Data from 3189 bone marrow aspirates, 3302 biopsies, and 3183 biopsy touch imprints identified hemodilution as the principal issue affecting bone marrow aspirate quality, whereas aspiration artifact and fragmentation affected bone marrow biopsy quality. CONCLUSIONS: The bone marrow synoptic reporting process was easy to use, readily adaptable, and has proved a useful component of the overall quality assurance process to optimize bone marrow quality.