Clinical laboratory information provides decision support for most healthcare providers and impacts care processes and patient outcomes throughout the entire health services delivery system. Evidence-based practice (EBP) describes systematic, data-derived strategies employed by clinical laboratory practitioners in production, interpretation, and communication of laboratory information. EBP includes health outcomes and diagnostic studies, cost- effectiveness analyses, practice guidelines development, and provider/patient/consumer education systems development. Evidence from analyses of these efforts is then used to measure the quality of and assign value to services delivered. Rapid advancements in technology, communications, and information analytics have intersected producing unprecedented opportunity for measuring healthcare effectiveness and efficiency for providers and individual patient/consumers. These rapid advancements have also contributed to challenging economics and heightened privacy concerns. How EBP strategies can be used to define value (highest quality at lowest cost) for providers and individual patient/consumers will be explored. Personalized healthcare delivery models will be discussed. Learn how the discovery and documentation of evidence-based practices help to promote quality and value in healthcare.

Learning Objectives:

At the end of the presentation, participants will be able to:

1. Define clinical laboratory science (CLS) evidence-based practice (EBP) constructs linking clinical research, quality improvement, and provider/patient/consumer education.

2. Describe CLS practices supporting evidence-based clinical decision- making in personalized healthcare.

3. Present EBP models describing the current status of clinical decision support systems and suggesting directions for further development.