In the clinical parasitology laboratory at Mayo Clinic, job satisfaction is up and ergonomic strain is down. Work difficulty is down, too, as is the pressure of time.
All that and much more was measured one year after bringing artificial intelligence into the laboratory to screen out the negatives.
"It has been a game changer for us," Bobbi S. Pritt, MD, MSc, DTMH, chair of the Mayo Division of Clinical Microbiology and director of the parasitology laboratory in Rochester, Minn., said of the lab’s use of an AI algorithm developed by Techcyte of Orem, Utah.
To detect parasites, "morphologic examination of clinical specimens by light microscopy remains the gold standard, and microscopy is very good if you have skilled, trained microscopists," said Dr. Pritt, who is professor of laboratory medicine and pathology, Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science. But detecting ova and parasites is a manual, subjective exam that requires a high level of training and skill, and in nonendemic settings where parasites are seldom seen, many specimens are negative. "This leads to low staff satisfaction, challenges in maintaining competency, and, if you have high volumes like we do, ergonomic issues and the potential to get distracted and miss the positives."