Proud Legacy of Enabling New Zealand
Proud Legacy of Enabling New Zealand - The Next Step
Date: 11 May 2020
Author: Hill Laboratories
We are pleased to advise you of an important new service that is going live in our Hamilton laboratory, one that we are very proud of and excited about. We are partnering with the Waikato DHB to provide additional testing capacity to their laboratory in Hamilton for SARS-CoV-2 (the coronavirus that causes COVID-19) in nasopharyngeal swabs.
Rapid and extensive testing for the coronavirus is important now, and likely to remain so for some time, given the eradication strategy that our country is now pursuing. The Waikato DHB felt that they needed additional laboratory capacity to ensure that the high numbers of daily coronavirus swab samples from potentially infected people in the Waikato could always be processed quickly.
We met with key staff from the Waikato DHB early in the lockdown, who were impressed by our world-class laboratory, the high calibre of our team, and our robust systems and processes. Having decided to work together, we very quickly moved into implementation mode, working closely with IANZ (the organisation that grants us our laboratory accreditation), who have been great to deal with.
We are so proud of our team for the hard work and long hours they have put in throughout the COVID-19 lockdown in order to set up this new service in record time. Dr. Eilidh Mowat, who leads our molecular biology team in Hamilton, will be working with Dr. Chris Mansell, Clinical Microbiologist at the DHB, to ensure all testing is completed to a suitably high standard.
Rest assured that strict safety and confidentiality protocols are in place due to the nature of this testing, and testing will be carried out in a secure laboratory environment by key personnel. The testing will also be kept separate from all the other testing we conduct for other clients.
Long known for our commitment to supporting NZ businesses, and being 100% New Zealand owned and operated ourselves, it feels good to be playing a role in helping NZ find a way through this health crisis.
Please note, Hill Labs are only testing samples for coronavirus that come directly from the Waikato DHB. We won't be accepting samples directly from clients/the general public.