This is not the Turnaround Time chart on the Lab Station Analytics tab. That one is a simple view of average hours against a 24-hour target. The dashboard on this page is the real measure — medians, 90th percentiles, per-stage breakdowns and rankings.
What you’re looking at
At the top are a range select — Last 7 days, Last 30 days, Last 90 days, defaulting to 30 — and an unlabelled refresh button. Everything below reflects the range you pick.The three pipeline tiles
One tile each for Drug Testing, Laboratory and Imaging. Each leads with the median and the words median TAT, then:
Read the p90 before the median. The median tells you what a normal day looks like; the p90 tells you what your slowest tenth is doing, and that is what generates the phone calls.
Durations are written at the scale that suits them — whole minutes under an hour (45 min), then hours to one decimal up to two days (3.7 h), then days (2.6 d). Where there is nothing to measure you get a dash, never a zero.
Drug-testing stage medians
The Drug-testing stage medians card splits the pipeline into Order → received, Received → screened and Screened → report, so a slow total can be traced to a stage. A long “order → received” is a courier or collection problem, not a bench one — no amount of bench speed fixes it. The card only appears once at least one of the three stages has a median to show.The three rankings
By test, By scientist and By site are ranked tables with an inline magnitude bar, so the outliers are visible without reading numbers. The columns are Completed, Median TAT, p90 and Slowest. The empty state. With nothing finished in the range, By test and By scientist read Nothing completed in this period. and By site reads No drug-testing collection sites in this period. Treat By scientist as a workload signal, not a scoreboard. A scientist holding the confirmations will always look slower than one running screens.The same numbers elsewhere
Turnaround also appears as a Turnaround Time report in the Analytics report catalogue — “Median time from request to result, and where it is slipping.” — with Laboratory and Radiology scopes, and it can be exported. It is the same measure over the same records; if the two disagree, check that the date range and scope match before reporting a discrepancy. See Lab analytics.Who can do this
Two gates sit in front of this page, and they fail differently.
A QC Officer holds this grant and nothing else — the role inspects work rather than altering it, so someone who can read every turnaround number on this page may be unable to touch a single result. A Lab Scientist reaches the whole bench but is denied Executive, Lab Analytics and Referral Commissions; a phlebotomist reaches test requests, lab intake and patients only.
Two behaviours surprise people:
- Enforcement is opt-in, per person. Somebody never saved in the permissions sheet is unrestricted, and the sheet warns “Saving starts enforcing” — from then on they can only do what is switched on there.
- A denied action is recorded; an allowed one is not. This page degrades quietly rather than erroring, and a figure you are not entitled to see is hidden or rendered as a dash — never as a zero.
If you cannot see it
Two different gates, with two different fixes.- Plan. The dashboard reads TAT dashboard is a Professional feature — “Track turnaround-time percentiles per test, per scientist and per site — for the lab and the imaging suite. Included from the Professional Lab plan.” — with a View plans button. See Change your plan.
- Permission. On a plan that includes it, someone without the grant sees Turnaround analytics is hidden over “Needs authorisation from your clinic owner or manager.” An owner or manager grants View turnaround-time analytics.
Check it worked
- All three tiles carry a median, or a dash where that pipeline has no completed work.
- The {n} completed count is large enough for the median to mean something before you act on it.
- Changing the range changes every figure on the page, tiles and rankings alike.
- The Turnaround Time report in the Analytics catalogue agrees with this page over the same range and scope.
Common issues
Everything reads faster than it feels
Everything reads faster than it feels
Turnaround is measured from the request, and for drug testing from the received time entered at accessioning. A specimen stamped with the time it actually arrived measures honestly — one stamped with the time somebody got to the keyboard does not. See Accession an incoming specimen.
TAT dashboard is a Professional feature
TAT dashboard is a Professional feature
The dashboard is gated on Professional Lab and above, alongside quality control, analyser integration and the owner dashboard. View plans takes you to the ladder.
A tile shows a median but no pending count
A tile shows a median but no pending count
Nothing is open in that pipeline for the range. A lab that runs no imaging will see the Imaging tile stay empty — see Imaging requests.
A test ranks badly on a handful of results
A test ranks badly on a handful of results
Small samples move medians a long way. Widen the range to Last 90 days before acting on a ranking.
Drug testing shows nothing at all
Drug testing shows nothing at all
You are not running regulated collections, so that pipeline has no records. See DOT testing.
The oldest-pending age keeps climbing
The oldest-pending age keeps climbing
Something is stuck rather than slow. Filter the queue by status and find it — see Work the bench queue.
FAQ
Does the TAT dashboard count weekends?
Does the TAT dashboard count weekends?
Yes. Every figure is elapsed clock time from the request, so a Friday-evening request that is reported on Monday carries the whole weekend. That is what a referrer experiences, which is why it is measured that way — compare like-for-like ranges rather than trying to net the weekend out.
Is this the same as the Turnaround Time report in Analytics?
Is this the same as the Turnaround Time report in Analytics?
Yes — the same measure over the same records, offered in two places because people look for it in two places. The report adds Laboratory and Radiology scopes and can be exported. If they disagree, the range or the scope differs.
Why is the median so different from the p90?
Why is the median so different from the p90?
Because a lab’s slow work is rarely typical work. The median describes the ordinary specimen; the p90 describes the tenth that waited on a courier, a repeat run or a confirmation. A wide gap between the two is a queueing problem, not a speed problem.
Can I use By scientist in an appraisal?
Can I use By scientist in an appraisal?
Read it as workload, not performance. The measure is elapsed time on the record, so whoever holds the confirmations, the repeats and the difficult panels will always rank slower than whoever runs the routine screens.
Why can a QC Officer see this but not fix anything?
Why can a QC Officer see this but not fix anything?
That is the role working as designed. A QC Officer holds View turnaround-time analytics and nothing else — quality oversight inspects work rather than altering it, and is read-only on patient records.