April 11 – 17 is National Medical Laboratory Week. We celebrate all medical laboratory professionals across Canada this week and the crucial role they play in patient care. Did you know?
- There are 48 Medical Laboratory Technologists (MLTs) who work at Southlake. About 33 MLTs work in the core laboratory and 15 MLTs work in the Anatomic Pathology lab. The core lab is located on West 2. It includes disciplines of Clinical Chemistry, Hematology and Coagulation, Transfusion Medicine and Microbiology. The Anatomic Pathology lab, commonly known as pathology lab, is located on the seventh floor of the West building. Anatomic Pathology provides information to the surgeons and physicians on the presence or absence and types of cancer and other abnormalities of all organ systems. Anatomic Pathology includes the disciplines of Histopathology and Cytopathology.
- There are 50 laboratory technicians at Southlake. They are responsible for collecting blood specimens, performing ECGs and preparing specimens for testing as well as for transport to reference laboratories by following appropriate guidelines and legislation such as Transportation of Dangerous Goods Regulations (SOR/2001-286). The laboratory technicians collect blood specimens from in-patients, Ambulatory Day Care Clinic and Cancer Centre Clinic.
- The laboratory technicians perform about 14,000 phlebotomies in a given month. Overall, Southlake laboratory reports about 2.5 million tests per year.
- The Southlake laboratory team has been instrumental in keeping up with rapidly evolving COVID testing methodologies and the testing process. They were involved in all steps of COVID testing including ordering, receiving, routing, transporting or testing and reporting COVID swabs. The laboratory technician team has been a part of the daily operations of the COVID Assessment Centre.
Laboratory staff have been #byyourside continuing to support the clinical teams. Please thank the laboratory team for what they all do for patient care!