Handwritten and carbon copy forms can make it difficult for labs to read data that then has to be manually entered into their LIMS.

Research sites may leave fields blank — either due to confusion about the data that should be collected, or an inability for someone at the site to track down the requested information — resulting in queries and delays.

Any time that data has to be entered in multiple places (i.e. as source data, on requisition forms, in EDC, and into LIMS systems), it creates duplicative work across the biospecimen lifecycle and increases the risk of transcription errors.

Under a traditional req form model, sponsors don’t have access to critical sample metadata until it is entered in EDC or available in lab sample reports. In many cases this data may not be available until the lab has accessioned the samples, sites have entered data into EDC, and queries have been resolved.

By housing the same sample metadata across multiple siloed systems and stakeholders that manually enter data, study stakeholders will inevitably have to resolve more queries.

Requisition forms collect sample metadata needed for downstream labs, but it doesn’t capture critical metadata needed for sample tracking — including sample chain of custody details and any other sampling activities that occur at the site.