What's New
Quest Diagnostics to Provide ELINCS Lab Results from National Data Exchange Hub
Quest Diagnostics is implementing an ELINCS interface for its national data exchange hub, which will allow Quest to deliver lab results in the ELINCS format to physician EHRs across much of the United States. The ELINCS interface will launch in December 2009.
Early Success for ELINCS Implementation Guide
A May/June 2009 article in the Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association describes how 15 organizations successfully used the ELINCS implementation guide to develop electronic lab interfaces. Read the article.
Now Available: EHR Implementation Test Script
The new EHR Implementation Test Script will help to determine if an EHR's HL7 interface software fully supports the ELINCS HL7-R1 specification. The Test Script Document is available to support use of the EDGE tool on the Testing Tool page.
ELINCS Implementations Spread Across California
More than 40 organizations across the state, involving over 165 health care provider locations, have implemented ELINCS or are in the process of doing so. For details, see the interactive map on the Implementations page.
What Is ELINCS?
ELINCS is the EHR-Lab Interoperability and Connectivity Specification. It standardizes the formatting and coding of electronic messages exchanged between clinical laboratories and ambulatory electronic health record (EHR) systems. ELINCS is an example of a clinical data standard -- an agreed upon set of rules that allow information to be shared and processed uniformly, thereby providing a common language for patient care. Adopting these standards helps health care providers deliver the right care by making information available at the right time. For more information, see the About ELINCS page.
Key Benefits of ELINCS
- Improved practice efficiency. Eliminates the need for physicians or office staff to manually enter lab data, scan paper lab reports, or track down missing results.
- Easier installation of EHRs. Dramatically reduces the time and cost required to build electronic interfaces between lab information systems and EHRs.
- Improved quality of care. Allows clinicians to compare results over time, graph trends, identify patients requiring interventions, and prevent unsafe or unnecessary treatment.
- More efficient reporting between labs and multiple EHR systems. Enables reporting to all physician practices in a community instead of just a few.
- Faster delivery of test results in a reliable and cost-effective method. Helps prevent errors and reduces costs.
Sponsors of ELINCS
In collaboration with health care providers, software vendors, commercial laboratories, government agencies, professional associations, and nonprofit organizations, the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF) sponsored the development, testing, and enhancements of ELINCS. For more information, visit www.chcf.org.
ELINCS has been adopted by Health Level 7 (HL7), the internationally recognized standards development organization for health information. HL7 has assumed responsibility for the ongoing maintenance and further development of ELINCS. For more information, visit www.HL7.org.