Intra-laboratory
Automation has had a significant and positive effect on laboratory function, yet anatomic pathology remains intensely labor-intensive. This is because only humans can perform certain tasks, and they, unlike machines, are subject to lapses in judgment when tired or pressured. My surgical pathology laboratory processes almost 30,000 cases a year. Since specimens tend to comprise multiple parts, many cases require numerous cassettes, leading to as many as 200,000 tissue blocks filed annually (Fig. 3). During the course of a workup, one cassette may yield multiple slides, so that the number of slides in a department could reach 300,000 each year, and these must be carefully organized. Many departments store prior tissue blocks and slides off-site, which imposes a sometimes unpredictable Time lag in retrieval. Moreover, during the period after the pathologist has finished a case, the slides must inevitably be held in limbo along with hundreds of other slides, prior to final filing. Patients who demand that their slides be immediately delivered to them or to some other destination will be disappointed and frustrated when they are informed that a certain amount of Time is needed to fulfill the request
