Common Labeling Pitfalls to Avoid in the Lab

You might think labeling is a pretty easy task; putting the specimen information on the label and then placing it on the sample, right? Nothing wrong with that, but you should know that labels have immense importance. All your important data is on these labels, and without them, you cannot identify your samples. These labels are the only source of identification of all the samples in the lab.
We have shed light on some common mistakes relating to labeling that most laboratories witness:

1. Getting Wrong Labels For The Applications

It was easy to get labels in previous times. However, the label technology has really picked up recently. As a result, there are a plethora of types of labels to choose from, making it difficult for you to choose the right one for a particular application. If you accidentally choose a label that doesn’t suit your application, you might end up facing a myriad of issues.
In order to choose the right label for your application, evaluate the kind of work that happens in your lab and the whole environment. Call a renowned company representative to review your lab’s environment, life science products, and see your requirements to give you a sample that you can check.

2. Forgetting To Put Bar Codes On The Label

Barcodes are very common today. Everything that your purchase from a store, be it as small as a water bottle, contains a barcode, so why not something as important as your lab samples have one?
Through bar codes, you can significantly improve the chances for identification, by eradicating mistakes and errors. In past times when labels were made with handwriting, the whole process of manually tracking caused a huge error rate. By implementing bar codes in your lab, you can enhance the integrity of the specimen because when you scan barcodes and collect all the data electronically, there’s really no room for error left.

3. Using Handwritten Labels

Even though the world is quickly moving towards digitization and electronic systems, you’ll still see a lot of people who still prefer to work manually. There are a lot of labs that hand-write their labels. It’s not like hand-writing only has cons since it does make the work easier by allowing anyone to just pick up a pen and write. However, labels aren’t easy to read and you cannot completely rely on hand-written labels. The ink can fade away or spread, causing the information to be misinterpreted. Consequently, errors will be committed.
Get through this problem by purchasing a basic easy-to-use printer for your lab. You could also install a computer labelling system that only requires an excel sheet and attaches it with label files. The data can then be printed. Printed labels are far better than hand-written labels because the text doesn’t smear, it’s easy to read for anyone, not just the technicians or lab directors.

4. Labelling Only For Your Laboratory

Ever since the industry has started to grow rapidly, the practice of sharing and collaboration has also seen significant growth. It’s important to have your labels made in such a way that can be read and interpreted by people who are outside of your lab as well. Every laboratory follows its own ways of labelling and identifying the samples. This allows people to choose what information they want to be written on the labels.

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