Abstract
At University of California, San Francisco, an automated cytopathology system has been developed to meet two main objectives: the information processing needs of the cytopathology department, and the integration of the cytopathology system into both the surgical pathology system, and the hospital information system. The cytopathology system has been in operation since March 1,1982. Benefits to the department include automatic SNOMED coding of diagnoses, online retrieval of diagnoses, automatic billing, faster turnaround between accession and signout, improved management, and reduced paperflow. Current interactions with the hospital information system include access to the centralized patient demographic file, access to medical data from other systems such as the clinical lab, medical records, radiology, and surgical pathology. Planned extensions include online signout of cases, and transmittal of cytology diagnoses to other clinical systems.