Awanui Laboratories Canterbury is proposing to discontinue the provision of a phlebotomist being on-call for 24 hours, 7 days a week.

• Over an 8-month period there has been 27 occasions where a phlebotomist has been called out, with most of these calls occurring just outside of regular hours.
• Of the 27 requests 37% were required urgently, 52% were routine collects that could have waited until the next regular service and in 11% of cases the patients were not at home when the phlebotomist arrived.
• 45% of calls were weekdays between 1700 – 1830 hrs, 18% Friday between 1730- 1930 hrs and 37% were weekends between 1300 – 1500 hrs.
• Most call outs (>70%) are to Age Residential Care (ARC) facilities in the Christchurch region.

Continuing to provide a 24/7 collections service to mainly ARC facilities is not sustainable or economical. Noting this, Awanui is willing to work alongside our referrers to ensure there is a solution for providing this service outside of Awanui staff. This could include upskilling your team to provide phlebotomy themselves when needed after hours. Removing on-call phlebotomy in Christchurch would also align the service across Te Waipounamu, with no other region providing 24/7 collections.

Provision of phlebotomy services to the community will still be available within the normal collection operating hours. Saturday, Sunday and public holiday home visits and aged care collections are reserved for clinically urgent collects only.

Awanui is happy to discuss the proposed change of service and is seeking your feedback for consideration. Feedback can be sent to tash.bambry@awanuilabs.co.nz before Thursday 17 June 2025.

We thank you for your consideration and continued support.