Table 2 Laboratory considerations for urgent care patients with critical bleeding

• Commitment of the laboratory and hospital administration to re-engineer standard processes with special emphasis on rapid turnaround time of a few selected tests important in trauma-related critical bleeding.

• Streamlined sample labeling, test requisition, sample transport, and accessioning.

• Stat-spinners, whole-blood assays, reduced sample preparation times.

• Rapid analytical tests or use of in-laboratory point-of-care technology.

• Direct reporting of results to the patient care area and to the blood transfusion laboratory.

• Policies that allow early release of preliminary values that would otherwise require reverification or duplicate runs if tested under less urgent conditions.