WORK SMARTER, NOT HARDER WITH BAYER'S ADVIA® WORKCELL
by Mike Martin for Medco Medical Newsletters

Efficiency.

It's a guiding concept with today's health professionals, who need more efficient performance in every task. Whether those tasks be labors of love with people who face challenges in a long road ahead, or routine procedures with the machines that help guide the way, the Bayer ADVIA® WorkCell brings speed, efficiency, and accuracy to the diagnoses that build the foundations of quality patient care.

Seamlessly integrating the ADVIA Centaur® for immunodiagnostics and the ADVIA® 1650 for clinical chemistry, the ADVIA® WorkCell achieves an amazing result: it treats each sample individually while dramatically reducing the labor required to handle sample loads that only seem to increase.

This extraordinary lab automation system:

1) Automatically routes individual samples for prescribed tests.
2) Reduces the number of steps required to sort, process and archive samples.
3) Minimizes errors by minimizing sample handling.

"The ADVIA® WorkCell allows us to consolidate testing -- which would have been done on four separate instruments and two different platforms -- into one work system," said Dr. Herbert Auerbach, Chairman of the Pathology Department at Abington Memorial Hospital in Abington, Pa. "Now four instruments can be managed by one technologist through the use of computers and robotics."

Dr. Auerbach's pathology team serves a non-profit, 508-bed community and teaching hospital that draws patients from three counties and has the only accredited trauma center in Montgomery County, Pa. Pathologists at Abington Memorial require the utmost efficiency and all it involves: speed, accuracy, volume, and care. For them, the ADVIA® WorkCell delivers.

One example: "Patient specimens, which would have been divided manually into numerous aliquots to be run on different instruments, can now be tested from one tube of blood," Dr. Auerbach explained. "Previously, we might have had to draw two or three tubes to do the same testing, so the WorkCell reduced that number."

"Reduction" is clearly a concept that guides the future of pathology and laboratory diagnostics. The ADVIA® WorkCell reduces the size of virtually every laboratory task.

"The WorkCell reduces the number of tubes that have to be drawn from a patient; reduces the number of tubes that need to be centrifuged; reduces the number of aliquots; reduces the potential for biohazard and repetitive stress injury; and reduces turnaround time," Dr. Auerbach said.

With the county's only trauma center, health professionals at Abington Memorial know the meaning of "stat." Fortunately, the system automating their pathology laboratory was designed with "stat" in mind. Emergency tests on the ADVIA® WorkCell may be run immediately on individual instruments or on the automated track. Downtime is nearly non-existent -- the ADVIA® WorkCell is a workhorse.

"The hardware reliability has been excellent with almost no downtime of the robotic sample manager and archiver, and absolutely no downtime of the track or distribution system," Auerbach explained.

He also commends Bayer's latest innovations.

"The WorkCell now allows a broader menu of testing available 24 hours per day, 7 days per week," Auerbach said. "The sample manager archives the specimens, which now allows us to retrieve a specimen easily for additional testing or add-on orders," he explained. "Previously, we manually looked through 1000 plus tubes per day to find a patient's sample to add on a test!"

With so much demand for laboratory automation, the ADVIA® WorkCell isn't the only system on the market, so why do pathologists such as Herbert Auerbach choose the WorkCell over the competition?

"We believe the WorkCell is the only truly integrated system which combines a high throughput chemistry analyzer with a high throughput immunoassay analyzer," Dr. Auerbach said. "Although other vendors have some very sophisticated robotic systems for centrifuging and aliquoting, we thought Bayer was the only vendor, who by integrating these systems into an affordable product, was able to really redesign the entire process," he added. "For us, the integration of the systems had the most impact."

Bayer designs and delivers top, innovative products such as the ADVIA® WorkCell because the people at Bayer listen -- to the people at your hospital, in your laboratory, and on your team.

"It has been a pleasure working with Bayer," Dr. Auerbach said. "They have been responsive to our suggestions and needs, and their entire sales, service and support teams are excellent."

Bayer presents the ADVIA® WorkCell. Because, as Dr. Herbert Auerbach says, what goes on in the laboratory "has an impact on the entire operation."

For more information concerning Bayer's ADVIA® WorkCell laboratory automation systems, please call Bayer Diagnostics at 1-800-255-3232 or e-mail Michael Iskra, michael.iskra.b@bayer.com. You may also contact a Bayer Diagnostics representative at , booth #______; or visit the product Web site at:

http://www.labnews.de/en/products/pr_workc.asp.