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Feb. 27th, 2007 07:17 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ladynox25When we receive a sample at work, it comes with a Chain of Custody, or CoC. This spells out the sample's ID, who the sample is from, who took the sample, when it was taken, how it is preserved, what tests need to be run, who gets billed for the work, who gets the report, etc. This is a legal document which includes evidence of where the sample was from the moment it was taken until the moment we received it. As such, the information in our computer system has to match the information on the CoC as closely as possible.[1]
The people who login the samples are quite good at their job: helping FedEx, UPS, and other carriers unload their many coolers; separating out rush and short holding time samples for priority logging; dealing with customers as they walk in, sample in hand; officially receiving samples; fielding telephone calls about this, that, and the other thing, and why isn't this logged yet, it's a rush sample; obliging techs who want QCIP samples logged; oh, yes, and by the way, actually logging samples. I'm sure I couldn't keep my head while doing that, but they manage to.
But, of course, when you get somewhere between 300-500 samples on an average day, there will be mistakes made. The more samples, the more errors, and it tends to go up logarithmically, not geometrically. Therefore, one of my jobs is to check the CoC's against what is in the system and make sure all errors are found and corrected.
All of this is to explain, as succinctly as possible, that I found a CoC in my stack today for a sample that came in over the weekend. The reason this sample caught my eye was the ID: Peter Pan Peanut Butter. The tests requested? ECMF/TCMF[2] and Salmonella. Well, we don't do Salmonella in-house, so that one got subcontracted out. Still, it is interesting to see something that's making national headlines come up at work.
[1] There are, of course, errors and omissions that crop up on a regular basis, such as miswritten dates. This was particularly noticeable back in early January: "Um, this CoC says that the sample was taken December 29, 2007; I don't think that can be right..." and similar instances. When this happens, we have to get the information fixed.
[2] ECMF and TCMF are Microbiology tests that look for 1) Ecoli and 2) Total Coliforms in a sample. We actually do about three different tests for these, but each one has a different method, and each is used for a slightly different purpose.
The people who login the samples are quite good at their job: helping FedEx, UPS, and other carriers unload their many coolers; separating out rush and short holding time samples for priority logging; dealing with customers as they walk in, sample in hand; officially receiving samples; fielding telephone calls about this, that, and the other thing, and why isn't this logged yet, it's a rush sample; obliging techs who want QCIP samples logged; oh, yes, and by the way, actually logging samples. I'm sure I couldn't keep my head while doing that, but they manage to.
But, of course, when you get somewhere between 300-500 samples on an average day, there will be mistakes made. The more samples, the more errors, and it tends to go up logarithmically, not geometrically. Therefore, one of my jobs is to check the CoC's against what is in the system and make sure all errors are found and corrected.
All of this is to explain, as succinctly as possible, that I found a CoC in my stack today for a sample that came in over the weekend. The reason this sample caught my eye was the ID: Peter Pan Peanut Butter. The tests requested? ECMF/TCMF[2] and Salmonella. Well, we don't do Salmonella in-house, so that one got subcontracted out. Still, it is interesting to see something that's making national headlines come up at work.
[1] There are, of course, errors and omissions that crop up on a regular basis, such as miswritten dates. This was particularly noticeable back in early January: "Um, this CoC says that the sample was taken December 29, 2007; I don't think that can be right..." and similar instances. When this happens, we have to get the information fixed.
[2] ECMF and TCMF are Microbiology tests that look for 1) Ecoli and 2) Total Coliforms in a sample. We actually do about three different tests for these, but each one has a different method, and each is used for a slightly different purpose.
