Change of laboratory IT system: 24 October, 6am – 1pm

October 23, 2023

Please be aware that blood sciences at SWB will migrate to a new laboratory information management system (LIMS) on Tuesday 24 October from 6am – 1pm which will affect the pathology service at Sandwell and City.

During the upgrade, Unity will remain available for viewing historical results; however, there will be no transmission of new results to Unity between 8am – 9.30am, therefore there will be a delay in receiving electronic results. During this time the laboratory will prioritise the most urgent requests from A&E, critical care, AMU, coronary care and paediatrics/neonates and urgent and abnormal results will be phoned through to the requestor.

From 6am – 1pm toxicology, chemistry, haematology and immunology orders will need to be placed on paper forms. We ask services to support this by only placing urgent requests during this time. Pathology staff will be onsite on Monday (23 October) and Tuesday (24 October) to provide additional paper forms if required. Please call 0121 507 6600 if you require additional paper forms in hours. If you require additional forms out of hours from 6am to 8am then please Bleep 5401 for CNPs or call the capacity office on ext. 4880.

Results transmission to Unity will re-commence from 9.30am, including those generated between 8am – 9.30am however electronic requesting will remain unavailable until 1pm. Please do not use “Add-On” requests during this time.

Please be aware that any paper requests submitted from 6am to 1pm once reviewed by pathology will be manually booked in by pathology. These requests will come back as unsolicited results in Unity and will require the requesting clinician to endorse.

The activity will be closely monitored, and desk top alerts will be issued from 5am advising colleagues of the need to revert to BCP for requesting chemistry, haematology and immunology requests during the maintenance.

Significant clinical changes can be found by visiting the pathology connect page.

Should you have any further queries then please call the pathology on 0121 507 6600 or email on swbh.pathology-it@nhs.net.