[Efficiency of a laboratory: opinions and evaluations of clinical physicians]

The opinions of 356 clinicists on the priority functions of a biochemical laboratory are analyzed and the efficiency of these functions performed by laboratories of a diagnostic center evaluated. The main laboratory functions were rated in accordance with the results of analysis. Besides the accuracy of the results, the respondents named time needed to obtain the results, the possibility of urgent information on the presence of manifest abnormalities, etc., as the most important factors. The author comes to a conclusion that other than analytical functions of laboratories are to be strictly defined and described as standards.