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.
Based on the site of the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Gateshead, the specialist unit will contain some globally recognised new technology that provides health professionals with all the medical testing needed to run a modern hospital and deliver fast, accurate results for patients.
The new centre will provide most of the pathology services for the NHS across Gateshead, Sunderland and South Tyneside but will also offer testing in a range of medical and other sectors.
One of the main advantages of the new centre is that it is fully automated, minimising human interaction with samples, which means there is less chance of contamination or wrong results.
Ian Renwick (QE Gateshead Chief Executive) said: “The importance of getting quick, accurate test results is valued both by patients and doctors in helping to assess what may be wrong and how they can be treated to the highest possible standard as soon as possible. Bringing this expertise under one roof, and using the very latest in specialist technology for pathology, has huge benefits for patients in this part of the North East.
“We’re extremely proud of this new centre of excellence and the potential it has for improving the way hospitals can access test results. In fact, this development has already attracted interest from other parts of the UK and the rest of the world because the specialist equipment is so cutting edge.”
Pathology manager Chris Charlton said: “This is a real success story for QE Gateshead and the unit is now attracting global attention with clinical teams from places like Sweden and Abu Dhabi coming to see the set-up we have here. We’re the only site in the UK to have some of these machines and will soon be one of only seven sites in the world to have this particular technology.
“This is now a fantastic, ultra-modern place to work and this will have some real benefits for the medical teams at the hospital and the GP surgeries in the region, but most importantly the patients who need their laboratory results.”
www.qegateshead.nhs.uk