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Examining Practice Levels and Educational Needs for the Profession
Clinical laboratory professional roles have evolved over the last century from pathologist’s assistants to the current spectrum of lab assistants, phlebotomists, technicians, technologists/scientists, managers, and educators. A professional doctorate role has been proposed, and a demonstration project is currently being developed. As the laboratory diagnostics industry continues to produce new instruments and testing methodology, the roles within the laboratory continue to change.
Discrepancies between the skills possessed by graduates of laboratory educational programs and the needs in today’s workplaces are a source of frustration to both laboratory managers and educators. Laboratory employees are frustrated by the lack of well-defined practice roles for technicians and technologists/scientists, and by the lack of opportunities for career advancement within the laboratory. As the workforce shortage worsens, clinical laboratories will need to use available personnel wisely, and decrease barriers to retention and recruitment into the profession wherever possible.
A multi-organization task force has been formed to analyze clinical laboratory practice levels and the educational needs for clinical lab practitioners. The group met in July, October, and again in January bringing together representatives from ASCLS, ASCP, AMT, CLMA and the diagnostics industry. CLT/MLT and CLS/MT educators, laboratory managers, and administrators in education and healthcare are all represented.
The group has identified seven project goals:
1. Define levels of practice to include knowledge, skills, competencies, and attributes at each level.
2. Evaluate titles for all levels of practice.
3. Develop a comprehensive career ladder.
4. Match educational curriculum to practice needs.
5. Develop a process to evaluate changes to practice needs and adapt educational curriculum.
6. Develop measures to monitor outcomes of the process.
7. Build consensus within the profession related to levels of practice.
The task force has chosen to use the Six Sigma method for designing improvements, and will spend the next two years collecting data, analyzing, designing process improvements, testing and measuring outcomes. Facilitator Rick Panning lead the group through the development of a project charter and the design phase of the process. Our industry representative, Paul Epner of Abbott Diagnostics, will assist with environmental assessments and projections of future needs. The task force collected baseline data from a wide range of sources, and is in agreement about “what is”. The prevailing question is “what should be?” A survey tool is being designed to obtain feedback that will help direct the task force to a new scope of practice model or vision.
The process may turn out to be as important as the project goals. Consensus building between the represented task force organizational members around these key professional issues could open the door to more collaboration on other issues in the future.
If we are successful, we will redefine the levels of practice needed to provide laboratory services in a rapidly changing health care environment and match educational curricula to these levels of practice. This should result in improved satisfaction for managers, educators, and employees and provide improved laboratory services for the public. It is an ambitious project, but the results will be well worth the effort.
Submitted by:
Robert Newberry, MT (AMT) Task Force Member |
