News & Communications
Update: diagnostic stewardship initiative for urinary tract infections
Awanui labs Auckland Microbiology is improving the quality of patient results by implementing a pre-analytical diagnostic stewardship initiative for community-acquired urinary tract infections. This involves the requirement for an appropriate symptom-based clinical indication for urine culture requests. From August 2024, urine culture requests with either no clinical details or inappropriate/irrelevant clinical details on the request […]
New Highbury collection centre
We are pleased to announce the opening of our new collection centre in Highbury on Tuesday 23 July. The Northcote collection centre has relocated to Highbury Shopping Centre, Shop 15, 1 c/o Highbury Pass and Birkenhead Avenue. Operating hours are from Monday to Friday, 07:00-16:00 hrs and Saturdays 8:00 to 12:00 hrs. We have appreciated […]
Changes to requesting of vitamin B12 and folate
You will recall in February we made changes to the requesting of vitamin B12 and folate. See article in The Scope for information. In Summary: We initiated the following changes: We are now implementing phase two of the strategy. We know that some Patient Management Systems (PMS) are still set up to order the combined B12/folate […]
Screening for colonisation with MRDO prior to hospitalisation
The burden of infections with multi-drug resistant organisms (MDRO) continues to increase globally and locally (1,2). A MDRO is defined as an organism that is resistant to three or more classes of antibiotics. Infections with these organisms can be challenging to manage as therapeutic antimicrobial options are limited. Therefore, various preventive measures are undertaken to […]
School holiday hours
As we approach the upcoming school holiday period, we would like to inform you of some adjustments to our collection services across Auckland from 6-21 July. We anticipate reduced patient demand, and therefore have chosen a small number of collection centres that will not operate during this time. This will affect the following centres: Panmure, […]
Diagnostic stewardship initiative for urinary tract infections
Diagnostic stewardship is defined as the process of modifying the requesting, performing, or reporting of diagnostic tests in order to improve diagnostic accuracy and patient management1. It involves requesting the right test, for the right indication, at the right time with the right interpretation of results. Diagnostic stewardship of infections promotes the appropriate use of […]
The Scope: June 2024
In this issue you will find: Download your copy here.
Diagnosis of Coeliac Disease
Coeliac disease is an immunological intestinal reaction to gluten in cereal causing the cells lining the small, intestine bowel to become damaged and inflamed. This is often found in people who are genetically predisposed to this condition. Coeliac disease in New ZealandAccording to international research, approximately 100,000 people across New Zealand have some form of coeliac […]
Matariki opening hours
Most of our collection centres will be closed on 28 June for the Matariki public holiday. Opening hours for centres operating can be found here.
King’s birthday weekend
Please find attached a list of collection centres open on King’s birthday, Monday 3 June. All other collection centres will be closed for the public holiday.