Applying The Delay

Delays to delay (as provided in OBX-13.1) are always applied from the date supplied for the observation timestamp in OBX 14.1 (or OBR-7.1 if OBX 14.1 is blank).

The observation timestamp must always reflect when the observation occurred (e.g. blood sample taken) and not be be populated with the date of another event (e.g. result released).

Delaying based on the process of reporting is not considered best practice because the disease progresses without waiting for the process of reporting, and the clinical safety risk of the patient not seeing their report goes up every day the report release is delayed.

If there are concerns about how quickly some test results might be released to patients, then consideration should be given to how the days to delay by is calculated before it is sent in the HL7 message.