LESSON 10

LABORATORY INFORMATION MANAGEMENT SYSTEM

A laboratory information management system (LIMS) is a software designed to make

laboratories more efficient and effective. The ultimate aim of a LIMS is to enhance efficiency in
laboratory operations by reducing manual procedures. There are core components of LIMS and
this are electronic laboratory notebooks, sample management programs, process execution
software, records management software, applications interface, workflow tools, client tracking,
best practice and compliance databases, and lastly ERP software. The US Occupational Safety
and Health Administration (OSHA) released an Occupational Exposure to Hazardous Chemicals
in Laboratories Standard (29 CFR 1910.1450) in 2011 to facilitate laboratory safety. LIMS covers
registration, billing, contract management, and monitoring of accounts receivable. LIMS assists
laboratories in setting priorities of current workloads based o the availability of analysts and
instruments. The LIMS functions enable users to set standards for the relevant range of patient
test results or to extract test result information for the purpose of quality assurance. LIMS
modules are commonly linked to a barcoding label generator, enabling a fast and easy method
of identifying tubes, samples, documents, and many others. The label can simply be printed on
a sticker and be placed on any item which needs identification. A bi-direction saves time in
programming test orders into the analyzer and eliminates errors in manual entry. This result in
a considerable enhancement of analyzer productivity.