ArticleBMC emergency medicine2022
Shorter laboratory turnaround time is associated with shorter emergency department length of stay: a retrospective cohort study.
Article in BMC emergency medicine, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 8 papers, 2 of them syntheses that pooled it.
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Who cites it
8 citing papers in PubMed, 2 syntheses or guidelines pooled it.
- Emergency department crowding in the modern era: a systematic review (2018-2025).Clinical and experimental emergency medicine · 2026Pooled it
- Prolonged length of stay and associated factors among emergency department patients in Ethiopia: systematic review and meta-analysis.BMC emergency medicine · 2024Pooled it
- From triplex to tetraplex: evaluation of the diagnostic accuracy of the new Roche Cobas Liat SARS-CoV-2, influenza A/B & RSV assay.Journal of clinical microbiology · 2026Observational
- The Impact of Urinalysis Turnaround Times on Patient Disposition in the Emergency Department.The western journal of emergency medicine · 2026Article
- When Brownian Motion Meets Clinical Laboratory Automation: A DLS-Inspired Autocorrelation Function for Characterizing Workflow Performance in Sample Processing.Diagnostics (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026Article
- Turnaround Time and Patients' Perceptions of Clinical Laboratory Services at a Tertiary Hospital in Pakistan: A Cross-Sectional Study.Health science reports · 2026Article
- Predicting the Unpredictable: A Data-Driven Machine Learning Model for Emergency Department Waiting Room Surge Status.Mayo Clinic proceedings. Digital health · 2026Article
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundA longer emergency department length of stay (EDLOS) is associated with poor outcomes. Shortening EDLOS is difficult, due to its multifactorial nature. A potential way to improve EDLOS is through shorter turnaround times for diagnostic testing. This study aimed to investigate whether a shorter laboratory turnaround time (TAT) and time to testing (TTT) were associated with a shorter EDLOS.
methodsA retrospective cohort study was performed, including all visits to the emergency department (ED) of an academic teaching hospital from 2017 to 2020 during which a standardized panel of laboratory tests had been ordered. TTT was calculated as the time from arrival in the ED to the ordering of laboratory testing. TAT was calculated as the time from test ordering to the reporting of the results, and was divided into a clinical and a laboratory stage. The outcome was EDLOS in minutes. The effect of TTT and TAT on EDLOS was estimated through a linear regression model.
resultsIn total, 23,718 ED visits were included in the analysis. Median EDLOS was 199.0 minutes (interquartile range [IQR] 146.0-268.0). Median TTT was 7.0 minutes (IQR 2.0-12.0) and median TAT was 51.1 minutes (IQR 41.1-65.0). Both TTT and TAT were positively associated with EDLOS. The laboratory stage comprised a median of 69% (IQR 59-78%) of total TAT.
conclusionLonger TTT and TAT are independently associated with longer EDLOS. As the laboratory stage predominantly determines TAT, it provides a promising target for interventions to reduce EDLOS and ED crowding.
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