Journal Article

Evaluating turnaround time to improve clients' satisfaction in the tuberculosis reference laboratory in Douala

Hamada Beloko, Teyim Pride Mbuh, Anya Priscilla Amveilla, Patricia Mendjime, Mohamed Youssouf Mfouapon, Bisso Ngono Annie Prudence, Esso Linda, Georges Alain Etoundi Mballa, Valérie Flore Donkeng Donfack

2025

Overview

IntroductionDelivery delays of laboratory results can result in death and/or economic loss to both the patient and the health system. Data is limited regarding turnaround time for tuberculosis testing in Cameroon. We evaluated intra- turnaround time in tuberculosis diagnosis, identified root causes, and brainstormed solutions to improve patient satisfaction.Materials and methodsIn this cross-sectional descriptive study, turnaround time for the pre-analytic phase was set at 3 hours, the analytic phase at 11 hours, and the post-analytic phase at 10 hours. The overall turnaround time was 24 hours. We used the Fishbone method of problem analysis involving the personnel of the Tuberculosis Reference Laboratory-Douala, to identify root causes. We brainstormed using the \"Whys\" causes of turnaround time failure during the process of tuberculosis diagnosis by GeneXpert MTB/RIF.ResultsWe analyzed samples from 526 clients. The median turnaround time was 45 (Range: 2-120) hours. A total of 216(41.1%) clients had a turnaround time failure. The turnaround time failures in the pre-analytic, analytic, and post-analytics phases were 64(29.6%), 128(59.3%), and 12(11.1%) respectively. Overall, 19 root causes of turnaround time failure were identified and grouped into six categories, namely: equipment, administration, technical-staff, environment, material, and method. Equipment maintenance (defective or non-calibrated modules) was the critical cause of turnaround time failures accounting for 86 (39.8%) of the overall turnaround time failure.Conclusionturnaround time in tuberculosis diagnosis is longer than expected, retarding patient care management. Focusing on equipment maintenance enhances the intra-laboratory testing process, thus improving overall patient satisfaction. The need for further studies to incorporate the extra-laboratory turnaround time in assessing the overall turnaround time is imperative.

• Publisher: Public Library of Science (PLoS)