Abbott Laboratories is an American multinational medical devices and health care company with headquarters in Abbott Park, Illinois, United States. The company was founded by Chicago physician Wallace Calvin Abbott in 1888 to formulate known drugs; today, it sells medical devices, diagnostics, branded generic medicines and nutritional products. It split off its research-based pharmaceuticals business into AbbVie in 2013.
A laboratory information management system (LIMS), sometimes referred to as a laboratory information system (LIS) or laboratory management system (LMS), is a software-based solution with features that support a modern laboratory's operations. Key features include—but are not limited to—workflow and data tracking support, flexible architecture, and data exchange interfaces, which fully "support its use in regulated environments". The features and uses of a LIMS have evolved over the years from simple sample tracking to an enterprise resource planning tool that manages multiple aspects of laboratory informatics.
Quest Diagnostics is an American clinical laboratory. A Fortune 500 company, Quest operates in the United States, Puerto Rico, Mexico, and Brazil. Quest also maintains collaborative agreements with various hospitals and clinics across the globe.
A medical laboratory scientist (MLS) or clinical laboratory scientist (CLS) or medical technologist (MT) performs diagnostic testing of blood and body fluids in clinical laboratories. The scope of a medical laboratory scientist's work begins with the receipt of patient or client specimens and terminates with the delivery of test results to physicians and other healthcare providers. The utility of clinical diagnostic testing relies squarely on the validity of test methodology. To this end, much of the work done by medical laboratory scientists involves ensuring specimen quality, interpreting test results, data-logging, testing control products, performing calibration, maintenance, validation, and troubleshooting of instrumentation as well as performing statistical analyses to verify the accuracy and repeatability of testing. Medical laboratory scientists may also assist healthcare providers with test selection and specimen collection and are responsible for prompt verbal delivery of critical lab results. An estimated 70% of medical decisions are based on laboratory test results and MLS contributions affect 95% of a health system's costs.
Laboratory informatics is the specialized application of information technology aimed at optimizing and extending laboratory operations. It encompasses data acquisition, instrument interfacing, laboratory networking, data processing, specialized data management systems, a laboratory information management system, scientific data management, and knowledge management. It has become more prevalent with the rise of other "informatics" disciplines such as bioinformatics, cheminformatics and health informatics. Several graduate programs are focused on some form of laboratory informatics, often with a clinical emphasis. A closely related - some consider subsuming - field is laboratory automation.
Point-of-care testing is defined as medical diagnostic testing at or near the point of care—that is, at the time and place of patient care. This contrasts with the historical pattern in which testing was wholly or mostly confined to the medical laboratory, which entailed sending off specimens away from the point of care and then waiting hours or days to learn the results, during which time care must continue without the desired information.
First Databank (FDB) is a major provider of drug and medical device databases that help inform healthcare professionals to make decisions. FDB partners with information system developers to deliver useful medication- and medical device-related information to clinicians, business associates, and patients. FDB is part of Hearst and the Hearst Health network.
A medical laboratory or clinical laboratory is a laboratory where tests are carried out on clinical specimens to obtain information about the health of a patient to aid in diagnosis, treatment, and prevention of disease. Clinical Medical laboratories are an example of applied science, as opposed to research laboratories that focus on basic science, such as found in some academic institutions.
Laboratory Corporation of America Holdings, more commonly known as Labcorp, is an American S&P 500 company headquartered in Burlington, North Carolina. It operates one of the largest clinical laboratory networks in the world, with a United States network of 36 primary laboratories. Before a merger with National Health Laboratory in 1995, the company operated under the name Roche BioMedical. Labcorp performs its largest volume of specialty testing at its Center for Esoteric Testing in Burlington, North Carolina, where the company is headquartered. As of 2018, Labcorp processes 2.5 million lab tests weekly.
Rodney Smith Markin, is an American pathologist and authority in the field of laboratory automation. In 1993, he designed and created one of the world's first automated clinical laboratory specimen, device and analyzer management systems. In the mid-1990s, he chaired a standards group called the Clinical Testing Automation Standards Steering Committee (CTASSC) of the American Association for Clinical Chemistry, which later evolved into an area committee of the Clinical and Laboratory Standards Institute.
Sunquest Information Systems Inc. is a leading U.S. developer of medical laboratory and diagnostic information solutions, with a user base of more than 1,700 hospitals and commercial laboratories. It was founded in 1979.
LabKey Server is a software suite available for scientists to integrate, analyze, and share biomedical research data. The platform provides a secure data repository that allows web-based querying, reporting, and collaborating across a range of data sources. Specific scientific applications and workflows can be added on top of the basic platform and leverage a data processing pipeline.
National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL) provides accreditation to Conformity Assessment Bodies (Laboratories) in India. NABL Schemes include Accreditation (Recognition) of Technical competence of testing, calibration, medical testing laboratories, Proficiency testing providers (PTP) & Reference Material Producers (RMP) for a specific scope following ISO/IEC 17025, ISO 15189, ISO/IEC 17043 & ISO 17034:2016 Standards. It has Mutual Recognition Arrangement (MRA) with Asia Pacific Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (APLAC), International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC).
LabLynx, Inc. is a privately owned, funded, and managed American corporation that develops, supports, and markets laboratory information management system (LIMS) solutions. Its primary offerings over the years have included webLIMS and ELab. The company’s primary clients include laboratories in the agriculture, clinical, environmental, forensics, health care, and manufacturing industries, including government agencies. The company is known for introducing one of the first browser-based LIMS products in 1997 and being in the laboratory informatics industry for decades.
Color is a population health technology company which provides genetic tests and analysis directly to patients as well as through employers. The product focuses on genes that indicate risk for heart disease, cancer, and that affect medication response.
Applied Spectral Imaging or ASI is a multinational biomedical company that develops and manufactures microscopy imaging and digital analysis tools for hospitals, service laboratories and research centers. The company provides cytogenetic, pathology and research laboratories with brightfield, fluorescence and spectral imaging clinical applications. Test slides can be scanned, captured, archived, reviewed on screen, analyzed with computer-assisted algorithms and reported. ASI system platforms automate the workflow process to reduce human error in the identification and classification of chromosomal disorders, genome instability, various oncological malignancies, among other diseases.
A coronavirus breathalyzer is a diagnostic medical device enabling the user to test with 90% or greater accuracy the presence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 in an exhaled breath. As of the first half of 2020, the idea of a practical coronavirus breathalyzer was concomitantly developed by unrelated research groups in the Singapore, United States, The Netherlands, Finland, Germany, Israel, England, Australia, Indonesia, Canada, Poland and United Kingdom.
Curative, Inc. is a healthcare startup company best known for scaling COVID-19 testing and COVID-19 vaccinations during the COVID-19 pandemic. Headquartered in San Dimas, California, and operating throughout the United States, the company was founded in January 2020 by Fred Turner, Isaac Turner, and Vlad Slepnev to create new diagnostic tests for sepsis and to improve outcomes for sepsis patients. In response to an urgent, unmet need for COVID-19 test development and production in the United States, Curative rapidly shifted focus in March 2020. The company's research team developed a new test for SARS-CoV-2 that utilized oral swabs rather than nasopharyngeal swabs. The Curative test was designed with a scalable process and opportunities to reduce healthcare worker exposure risk and the amount of personal protective equipment (PPE) used. An independent manufacturing and supply chain model was adopted to avoid competing with existing COVID-19 test companies for limited supplies and laboratory capacity.
Michael Joseph Mina is an American epidemiologist, immunologist and physician. He was formerly an Assistant Professor of Epidemiology & Immunology and Infectious Diseases at Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, Assistant Professor of Pathology at Brigham and Women's Hospital, Harvard Medical School, and currently Chief Medical Officer at eMed.
The New Zealand Microbiology Network (NZMN) is an advisory group to the Ministry of Health in New Zealand. It was established in 2014 through a contract from the Ministry of Health to the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR).
