Upon receipt, specimens were gamma-irradiated on dry ice and stored at −70°C.
Upon receipt, the specimen was digested and decontaminated with the N-acetyl-L-cysteine-sodium hydroxide method and smears were prepared for auramine staining.
The consensus process resulted in the following 15 terms: admission, order, biopsy/examination, receipt of specimen in laboratory, procedure completion, interpretation, dictation, transcription, verification, report available, delivery, physician views report, treatment, discharge and discharge letter sent.
Upon receipt, the specimens were surface labeled using methods similar to those previously described.
Turn around time (TAT) was estimated as the time, in days, from the receipt of specimens to the time results were available in the laboratory.
Because subsequent steps in infection control and patient management heavily depended on the test results, MERS-CoV testing at CDPH was expedited; the typical turnaround time was 4 hours from receipt of specimens to reporting of results.
In total, we identified 15 points in time regarding the description of the process independent from the respective user, although some are predominantly relevant for TATs in a specific domain (e.g. "receipt of specimens in laboratory" in a laboratory).
We found no difference (P = .20) between academic and community sites in the time elapsed from surgery to the receipt of specimens in the reference laboratory (community sites: 57 patients; median, 48 days [range, 18 days-90 days]; academic sites: 24 patients; median, 53 days [range, 20 days-90 days]).
Overall, the time from receipt of specimens to reporting ranged from 1 day to 27 days (median, 11 days; mean, 12 days), which is similar to that reported for patients with advanced NSCLC (range, 1 day-47 days; median, 11 days; mean, 12 days).
The mean time delay between receipt of a specimen in the laboratory and issuing of the final report was 22 days (range 7 60 days).
In most cases, laboratory reports were provided within 24 hours of specimen receipt.
