Effect of Surgical Specimen Chain Management Information System on specimen management in operating room: a pilot Quasi-Experimental study

TL;DR

A new information system improved surgical specimen handling accuracy and speed in operating rooms, boosting staff satisfaction.

Contribution

This study introduces a Surgical Specimen Chain Management Information System integrated with management principles for specimen handling.

Findings

The intervention group showed significantly higher qualified rates for permanent specimen handling, including fixative adequacy and total handling.

Specimen handling duration was significantly shorter in the intervention group for both permanent and intraoperative frozen specimens.

User satisfaction scores were higher in the intervention group across all dimensions and total satisfaction.

Abstract

The proper handling of surgical specimen during the pre-analytical phase directly impacts diagnostic accuracy and patient’s treatment plan. Specimen handling involves multiple steps and departments, making it prone to errors. Ensuring seamless operation at each stage and continuously reducing the incidence of specimen handling errors remain critical priorities for perioperative staff. Current research primarily focuses on improving management practice or enhancing equipment automation, with rare studies exploring the integration of management principles into information system.

This research adopted a pilot Quasi-Experimental study, reporting followed the TREND statement guidelines. By convenience sampling, 1,780 surgical specimens collected from March to April 2025 (1,259 permanent specimens and 521 intraoperative frozen specimens) were assigned to the control group, while 1744 surgical specimens collected from May to June 2025 (1,259 permanent specimens and 485 intraoperative frozen specimens) comprised the intervention group. Control group utilized the existing Hospital Information System, whereas the intervention group employed the Surgical Specimen Chain Management Information System. Chi-square test and Mann-Whitney U test were conducted to compare specimen handling qualified rates and specimen handling duration between the two groups. Wilcoxon signed-rank test was employed to analyze the satisfaction of the operating room nurses.

After the implementation of the Surgical Specimen Chain Management Information System, the permanent specimen of intervention group exhibited a statistically significant improvement in qualified rate of specimen handling comparing with the control group in terms of fixative adequacy (p = 0.006, OR = 3.371, 95% CI:1.349–8.422), qualification of orientation(P = 0.045, OR = 3.019, 95% CI: 0.971–9.387), and total qualified specimen handling (P < 0.001, OR = 3.799, 95% CI: 2.048–7.047), with statistically significant differences and moderate to large effect sizes except the qualification of orientation. There was no statistically significant difference in the qualified rate of intraoperative frozen specimen handling between two groups. The duration of specimen handling of permanent specimen (P < 0.001, R = 0.59, 95% CI: 0.56–0.62) and intraoperative frozen specimen (P < 0.001, R = 0.47, 95% CI: 0.41–0.52) in the intervention group were significantly shorter than those in the control group, and the differences were statistically significant along with a medium to large effect sizes. Additionally, user satisfaction scores in the intervention group surpassed those of the control group across all six dimensions and total satisfaction score (P < 0.001).

Integrating management principles into HIS may provide an efficient and cost-effective potential for surgical specimen management in operating room, which aligned well with the current operational model that combined information system with manual specimen delivery process.

Chinese Clinical Trial Registry ChiCTR2500114109, registered on 8 December 2025. This study was retrospectively registered.

The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12912-025-04288-y.

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