Patient Safety and Healthcare Quality

Organization (Website) Origin: Agency for Healthcare Research & Quality (AHRQ) (www.ahrq.gov)

Topic Brief: Project RedDE is a catchy acronym for “Reducing Diagnostic Errors in Primary Care Pediatrics”. It is a Toolkit for practice teams in pediatric primary care, endorsed by the American Association of Pediatrics, and funded by AHRQ.

There are several subtopics within the RedDE Toolkit, “Labs” being one of them! Specifically, missed or delayed actionable labs are the target of this tool within the Toolkit. The “Labs” tool identifies five “frequent, sub-critical, actionable” laboratory test results on which pediatric primary care teams should focus their efforts: sexually transmitted infections, microcytic anemia, elevated lead, positive Strep culture, and TSH abnormality.

The “Labs” tool goes on to suggest several strategies to reduce missed or delayed actionable test results. Some strategies call for creation of a specific protocol or algorithm for addressing actionable results based on existing evidence, and others suggest phrases for communicating actionable results in patient charts. Examples of documentation and video success stories from real pediatric clinics are peppered throughout the Toolkit.

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