RECENT NEWS

A specialist school in Liverpool’s Baltic Triangle has joined forces with a Wirral business to prepare its students for the business roles of tomorrow. Liverpool Life Sciences UTC has collaborated with Pro-Lab Diagnostics to enhance its students’ skills and work-related learning experience while improving their employability within the science and healthcare sectors.

Royal Philips will support oncology researchers' efforts to analyse pathology samples by offering advanced image analysis algorithms from Indica Labs as part of its Digital Pathology Solutions offerings. The collaboration will allow pathology researchers to apply intelligent algorithms to digitised pathology slides, which may enhance their ability to detect, process and extract information from tissue samples than currently possible using a conventional microscope.

Irish scientists are developing a new €25 blood test for bowel cancer, which could save thousands of lives by spotting the disease at the earliest possible opportunity. The simple check will pick up antibodies in the blood, produced as the body reacts to the onset of bowel cancer.

A North East hospital is putting the finishing touches to a new £12 million laboratory that will bring world-class testing facilities to the North of England. Once completed The Pathology Centre will be a new, state-of-the-art facility operating at the cutting edge of pathology testing services in the UK.

Wyatt Technology has highlighted an article which outlines the benefits of quantifying protein-protein interactions (PPI) using automated dynamic light scattering (DLS) in high-throughput screening (HTS) mode to identify promising candidates for drug-like properties.

Binding Site has been chosen as an important diagnostic partner in the Black Swan ‘cure myeloma’ research initiative, sponsored by the International Myeloma Foundation (IMF). The initiative will coordinate an international collaboration led by an elite team of world experts in the field of multiple myeloma. This expert panel has identified the tools needed to confirm the various drug regimens that will achieve a path to a cure, including the use of Binding Site’s Freelite and Hevylite tests.

The sale and use of legal highs has been described in Parliament as a “national emergency”. For legal high users who end up in hospital or on treatment programmes, it is important to be able to measure these new substances in patient samples.

When Royal Oldham Hospital, the hub laboratory within the Pennine Acute Hospital, tendered for replacement haematology instrumentation, it was clear that an innovative solution would be required to meet its full automation requirements within a very confined location. The XN Haematology solution from Sysmex is renowned for its high-quality results, high throughput and small footprint, but with a requirement for fully automated ESR testing, and full EDTA solution, fitting a square peg into a round hole was going to be challenging.

Hologic has announced a five-year contract for its ThinPrep Pap tests and processing equipment with Derby Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. With this agreement, Royal Derby Hospital will be the largest ThinPrep processing laboratory in the UK, with an estimated 150,000 samples processed annually.

The Mast Uri System is an innovative, rapid and streamlined, semi-automated laboratory solution for the microbiological analysis of urine samples, to aid the diagnosis of urinary tract infections (UTI). In comparison to traditional bacterial culture based methodologies, the Mast Uri System offers higher throughputs, simplified processing and rapid turnaround times, while significantly reducing costs and waste.

Become a Company member of the Institute of Biomedical Science (IBMS) and enjoy privileged access to key events and decision makers in the profession.

Following the success of the recent one-day PQT Conference, hosted by Pathology in Practice, the organisers are now pleased to announce their second one-day event, The R&R Conference, to be held on 15 October, focusing this time on Reprofiling, Reconfiguration and Tendering.

Beckman Coulter Diagnostics has obtained CE marking for the VERIS MDx system and VERIS human cytomegalovirus (CMV) assay, which is a key milestone in the expansion of the company’s presence in molecular diagnostics. The VERIS MDx system is a fully automated, random-access molecular diagnostics system for the quantitative and qualitative analysis of molecular targets from patient specimens.

North Bristol NHS Trust and University Hospitals Bristol NHS Foundation Trust in partnership with Public Health England (Bristol) and Weston Area Health NHS Trust have appointed CliniSys and Capita Healthcare Decisions to deliver an integrated laboratory information system for all areas of pathology across the region. The Capita and CliniSys solution was selected following a competitive tender and evaluation process involving all four organisations. (Image: mattbuck commons.wikipedia.org CC-BY-SA-2.0)

Cepheid has released performance data for its Xpert HPV, currently in clinical trials with a targeted CE-IVD release this year. “We’re pleased with the early Xpert HPV data that highlight Cepheid’s commitment to delivering tests that offer the unmatched combination of performance, ease of use and speed that our customers expect,” said John Bishop, Cepheid’s chairman and CEO. (Image: National Cancer Institute/Laboratory of Tumor Virus Biology)

Menarini has announced the launch of Total Tissue Diagnostics, a fully integrated laboratory solution that is flexible, scalable and tailored to individual laboratory’s requirements. The range of new innovations encompasses all elements of cellular pathology, from specimen collection to issuing the report, to provide a more patient-focused service. This includes systems for controlled specimen fixation and transport, macro-digital imaging, rapid tissue processing, auto-embedding, a complete portfolio of general histology products, molecular morphology and digital pathology.

Veolia Water Technologies UK, Elga Process Water, Elga LabWater and Aquafab have, once again, had their approach to occupational health and safety recognised in an awards scheme run by the Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (RoSPA). Veolia received the prestigious President’s Award for the second year running, having gained the society’s Gold Medal for the 11th consecutive year. The presentations were made at the Award Ceremony held recently at the Hilton Birmingham Metropole Hotel, at the National Exhibition Centre.

On 1 May, GSTS Pathology and KingsPath united to become Viapath, a new brand for one of the UK’s leading specialist providers of pathology services. As a public-private partnership, Viapath remains majority owned by the NHS. With the commercial freedom to invest in growth and innovation, the company is ambitious and committed to the achievement of high clinical standards and high levels of operating efficiency in pathology services across the UK.

LGC has extended its use of GXPi’s Enterprise Compliance Platform (GECP) and X-docs electronic document management software. Following a successful six-month trial in its renamed Laboratory & Managed Services division, LGC will now utilise X-docs and complimentary X-forms to ensure that all documentation pertaining to its standard operating procedures, policies, guides and audit management will be easier to create, maintain and retrieve across the division in the UK and USA.

TAP Biosystems, a supplier of innovative cell culture systems and consumables for life science applications, has announced that its Fill-It automated benchtop vial filling system is being used routinely at an innovative cell therapy company developing cancer immunotherapies. This has improved processing speed and throughput of large batches of cells in cryovials for use as master cell banks or as cell-based immunotherapies.