Pam Banning

The laboratory team of the 3M clinical terminology group is in its 18th year of providing laboratory terminology consulting to the public. In the beginning, a client said the phone […]

Graduating with two Bachelor of Science degrees (biology and medical technology), the sciences ruled my younger world. My term schedules had only the minimum number of humanities electives for the […]

Our clinical terminology team’s background in nursing, pharmacy, radiology, laboratory and other clinical areas gives us insight into how health care systems are burdened with the sheer volume of data […]

Ever been caught off guard hearing about UFO sightings because the physics makes no sense? The Pentagon calls UFOs by a different name: UAPs (unidentified aerial phenomena). I was surprised […]

My husband and I are very fortunate to have our surviving parents reach their eighth decade, even though one has received a diagnosis of dementia. Small interpersonal observations over time […]

Given the need for new laboratory and clinical terminology codes, driven by the COVID-19 pandemic, the International Spring LOINC conference of 2021 grew by one more day to address a […]

We’ve all been hearing about the shortage of SARS-CoV-2 testing kits and materials, but there’s another shortage in the labs that hasn’t been widely mentioned. A human must perform the […]

We’re all hearing daily about how much COVID-19 testing is taking place and how many people are diagnosed with the virus or cleared from having it. The test result is […]

Unprecedented times call for unprecedented measures. Most In Vitro Diagnostic (IVD) manufacturers that can adapt their instrumentation to SARS-CoV-2 testing are doing so. Since the FDA started authorizing Emergency Use […]

Wuhan, the capital of Central China’s Hubei province, is under siege. Hundreds of thousands of people are being screened for fever and observable signs of illness at travel junctures. Nearby […]

I recently listened to a laboratory medicine podcast on the need for clinician friendly terms in laboratory testing. They gave various ordering error examples where the assay values provided no […]

September 13 is World Sepsis Day and the whole month of September is filled with campaigns designed to help both the public and healthcare facilities recognize sepsis symptoms and seek […]

The Regenstrief Institute released version 2.66 of the Logical Observation Identifiers Names and Codes (LOINC) on June 21st this year. LOINC is one of the standard terminologies in the 3M […]

LOINC’s 25th Anniversary was celebrated on February 16, 2019 with a social media blitz and many well wishes from around the world on Twitter and the LOINC Forum. Standing for […]

Recently, my family took me to an Emergency Room when I suddenly lost my sense of touch on the left side of my face. Fully conscious and cognizant of all […]

The American Association of Clinical Chemistry (AACC) held its 69th Annual Scientific Meeting and Clinical Lab Expo in San Diego in August, in collaboration with the Canadian Society of Clinical […]

The Lab LOINC committee convened at the Regenstrief Institute in Indianapolis on December 8, 2016 for a day of discussion and decision making. The liveliest topic amongst participants this session […]

3M HIS has been busy participating in professional healthcare industry meetings during the first half of 2016. This included Clinical Lab Management Association’s ThinkLab, The American Society of Microbiology (ASM) […]

Laboratorians are trained to use exact measures in quality to provide the right answer on the right patient at the right time. This attention to precision is the cornerstone in […]

There’s been a lot of attention on standardizing laboratory order sets in the past year in preparation for the Meaningful Use requirements for computerized physician order sets (CPOE). The Standards […]