A £1 MILLION “train set” is up and running in Dundee’s Ninewells Hospital, transporting and testing patients’ samples, writes Marjory Inglis, health reporter.

Every day 2500 samples of blood and other fluids are sent to the hospital for testing in the biochemical medicine laboratories. They come from GP surgeries all over Tayside, North East Fife and Forth Valley, as well as from the wards and theatres in the hospital.

The more speedily samples can be “turned around” and the results fed back, the faster patients can get appropriate treatment.

That’s where the recently installed system has made a big difference. Dubbed a “train set” by Dr Callum Fraser, clinical director of biochemical medicine, it incorporates a track with “points” that turn racks of sample tubes off on to “branch lines,” through a series of automated tests to analyse the contents.

It recognises bar code-type patient identifiers, linked to a database of all 1.3 million patients in Tayside, North East Fife and Forth Valley.

Leasing the train set costs £1 million a year, but Dr Fraser said it has been provided at no extra cost to his department as it is more efficient than previous ways of working.

He and his team are very pleased with the new set-up, the first of its kind in Scotland and only the 50 th worldwide. The risk of contamination is reduced to virtually nil and specialists are freed up to concentrate on examining samples needing further action.

Dr Fraser said the automated analyser carries out 70 of the most common tests on, mainly, blood and urine samples. They check kidney, liver, bone and heart functions, fertility, screen for Down’s Syndrome and can check for cancer markers in blood.

“We get around 2500 requests a day for laboratory tests in here,” said Dr Fraser. The system was also operating in Perth Royal Infirmary, where 1000 samples a week are processed, he said.

Jack McIntosh, head biomedical scientist in the Ninewells labs, explained computer links in every Tayside GP surgery will allow almost immediate delivery of results.

“Within a quarter of an hour of us being finished with the tests and having the results, they are available to the doctor whether he is in Pitlochry or Ninewells,” said Mr McIntosh.

For most tests the team can send out results on the same day the sample was collected from the patient.

The next big step will be paper-free test requests. “We are already doing that in the hospital,” said Dr Fraser. “We are about to start that with four pilot GP practices.”

Within a month GPs in Blairgowrie, Montrose, the Westgate Health Centre in Dundee and Erskine Practice (part of Arthurstone Medical Centre in the city) will be making electronic test requests. Every GP practice in Tayside should be doing so within 18 months.