LRN Results Messenger and LIMS Integration
Background
Laboratory results are a critical component of public health practice and help drive decisions during a public
health response. To support early event detection and response, public health laboratories should have the
capacity to share standard electronic data with one another and other public health partners. Enabling industry
standards for laboratory data management and exchange will help ensure that public health partners can send,
receive, and utilize laboratory results when and where they need them.
The anthrax events of 2001 provided an acute example of the importance of standards-based data interoperability
among public health laboratories. More than one million laboratory tests on over 125,000 samples were reported
during the event. Responding organizations did not have the capacity at the time to share critical laboratory data
effectively using standard and interoperable means. Interoperable data exchange would have strengthened the response
by reducing the amount of human effort and time required for effective data management.
