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ASCP Recognizes 2022 Choosing Wisely® Champions for Reducing Unnecessary Testing and Waste in Health Care

Three East Carolina University and ECU Health Leaders are being Honored as Choosing Wisely® Champions for Driving Healthcare Change

Sept. 6, 2022 (CHICAGO) — Three leaders at East Carolina University (ECU) and ECU Health are being recognized by the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) as 2022 Choosing Wisely® Champions for advancing appropriate use of testing at their health system and for demonstrating leadership of a local Choosing Wisely® effort. They are:

  • Yaolin Zhou, MD, associate professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, head of Molecular Pathology and director of Quality and Test Utilization at ECU’s Brody School of Medicine and ECU Health
  • Greeshma Sheri, MD, assistant clinical professor of General Internal Medicine, at ECU’s Brody School of Medicine and ECU Health
  • James Manning, MD, ECU Health Hospitalist Medical Director

Dr. Zhou standing in front of a sign that reads "The 2022 ASCP Awardees!"Dr. Zhou will present the results of ECU Health’s Choosing Wisely® initiative as the ASCP 2022 Annual Meeting, Sept. 7-9, in Chicago. ASCP’s Choosing Wisely® Champions program is part of ASCP’s broader Choosing Wisely campaign, an initiative of the ABIM Foundation, which seeks to advance a national dialogue on avoiding unnecessary medical tests, treatments and procedures.

“Identifying Champions and sharing their successes allows all of us to learn from their efforts to improve healthcare delivery,” said Lee H. Hilborne, MD, MPH, DLM(ASCP)CM, FASCP, chair of the ASCP Effective Test Utilization Steering Committee. “Dr. Zhou, Dr. Sheri, and Dr. Manning are exemplars of Choosing Wisely® values and the application of this effective test utilization initiative.”

In September 2020, ECU’s Zhou and Sheri, and ECU Health hospitalist Manning, partnered to launch an innovative program, Choosing Labs Wisely, to reduce unnecessary repeat daily laboratory testing. Evidence from studies shows daily lab draws rarely change patient management, require extra time and expense, cause patient discomfort and dissatisfaction and contribute to hospital-acquired anemia and blood transfusions. To accomplish the goal of 20 percent reduction in targeted tests, the Choosing Labs Wisely team used the Exploration, Promotion, Implementation, Documentation, Evaluation and Modification (EPIDEM) quality improvement model (available at bit.ly/EPIDEM), which democratizes and demystifies the steps of quality improvement.

With key stakeholders, Zhou, Sheri, and Manning shared specialty specific Choosing Wisely® recommendations and data that their providers ordered complete blood counts, metabolic panels, magnesium and phosphorus labs more frequently than outside peers. After months of promoting and obtaining buy-in and approval from clinicians, formal committees, hospital leadership, trainee physicians, nursing, quality, etc., on April 19, 2021, the intervention was implemented, with the removal of the three-times-a-day ordering option. The team developed dashboards to document and evaluate the program’s efficacy. From September 2020 through June 2022, there was a 15- to 25-percent reduction in targeted laboratory orders per inpatient day at ECU Health, which should translate into higher patient satisfaction and improved patient care.

Zhou is a past ASCP Choosing Wisely® Champion from 2017. In addition to presentations to pathology and non‐pathology audiences about Choosing Wisely®, Dr. Zhou presented “Choosing Tests Wisely: What, Why, and How to Make a Difference,” for an ASCP webcast on March 1, 2018.

“Reducing daily repeat laboratory testing is only the beginning,” Zhou said. “The team will continue to make modifications to sustain and expand Choosing Wisely® efforts, advancing ECU Health’s mission of improving the health and well‐being of eastern North Carolina by creating an ‘EPIDEMic’ of improved patient care.”

About ASCP

Founded in 1922 in Chicago, ASCP is the world’s largest professional membership organization for pathologists and laboratory professionals. ASCP provides excellence in education, certification, and advocacy on behalf of patients, anatomic and clinical pathologists, and medical laboratory professionals. To learn more, visit the ASCP website. Follow ASCP on Twitter and connect with ASCP on Facebook.

About the ABIM Foundation

The mission of the ABIM Foundation is to advance medical professionalism to improve the health care system. We achieve this by collaborating with physicians and physician leaders, medical trainees, health care delivery systems, payers, policy makers, consumer organizations and patients to foster a shared understanding of professionalism and how they can adopt the tenets of professionalism in practice. To learn more about the ABIM Foundation, visit www.abimfoundation.org, connect with us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter.

About Choosing Wisely®

First announced in December 2011, Choosing Wisely® is part of a multi-year effort led by the ABIM Foundation to support and engage physicians in being better stewards of finite health care resources. Participating specialty societies are working with the ABIM Foundation to share the lists widely with their members and convene discussions about the physician’s role in helping patients make wise choices. Learn more at www.ChoosingWisely.org.