Testing machinery at Awanui Lab's Auckland facility broke down in February. The company is now sending some samples to Wellington for processing. Photo / Mike Scott
Testing machinery at Awanui Lab's Auckland facility broke down in February. The company is now sending some samples to Wellington for processing. Photo / Mike Scott
Awanui Labs has been couriering 250 community tests to Wellington daily after its machinery in Auckland broke down.
Two shipments were temporarily lost by couriers, containing hundreds of specimens.
Awanui has proposed sending all immunology samples to Wellington on a permanent basis, cutting 11 jobs.
Hundreds of blood tests were lost in transit after Auckland’s only community laboratory began couriering most of its samples to Wellington for processing.
Awanui Labs in Auckland has been sending immunology samples to Wellington since February after its processing machinery broke down - a workaround which may soon becomepermanent.
In that time, two shipments including 100s of specimens have “gone missing”, according to the union for lab workers.
“They’ve either been left in a warehouse or they’ve just not turned up when they should have,” said Rachel Roth, secretary for medical laboratory workers at the APEX union.
“And because those samples are no longer refrigerated they are long past being viable, they have to then go back to Auckland, re-aliquot the samples up there and send them all down again.
“So that’s happened twice, and that’s a real issue with sending samples away for testing.”
Awanui Labs confirmed samples were “delayed” because of a third-party courier. They were relocated again through GPS tracking.
In one case, the samples were tracked within a few hours and were still viable. In the other case, the lab had to re-collect new specimens using samples which it retained in its Auckland lab.
“Results were still reported within the expected timeframe,” said chief operations officer, Nick Champness.
A consultation document obtained by the Herald shows that Awanui’s lab at Wellington Hospital began processing Auckland’s immunology samples in mid-February after the processing machinery in Auckland broke down.
These are typically non-urgent screening tests for conditions such as coeliac disease. More urgent tests, such as measles, were done by public health authorities, Awanui said.
Engineers attempted to fix the testing instruments. However, after a week technical staff and the clinical pathologist “had no confidence” in the operation of the machinery.
As a result, immunology samples were redirected to Wellington.
About 250 tests are being driven by third-party couriers to Wellington every weekday, with an airfreight shipment being made every Sunday.
“As the turnaround time for immunology tests has been generally accepted to be within 7 days, the transfer of specimens to Wellington for processing has had no impact on turnaround time,” the document said.
After a review, Awanui has now proposed shifting some of Auckland’s lab work to Wellington permanently. The Wellington lab would also process samples from around the North Island.
That would lead to the loss of 11 jobs at the Auckland facility. Some of those workers could be rehired at the Wellington lab.
Around 250 blood samples are being couriered from Wellington to Auckland each day for processing.
Champness said the breakdown of the Auckland machinery had provided an opportunity to “improve efficiency” and “enable economies of scale” with a single processing location in the North Island.
The Wellington facility had a greater range of tests than in Auckland and was a potential long-term location for this work, he said. Discussions were ongoing and no final decisions had been made.
Roth said the proposal was a “cost-cutting exercise” which would likely lead to delays and problems with recruitment.
The Wellington lab did not have capacity to take on all of Auckland’s immunology tests, she said. And it was difficult to recruit the required specialist staff as wages were much higher in the public system.
Awanui Labs has previously said its funding had not kept up with the financial pressures created by pay equity settlements in 2023 (which meant lab technicians in the public sector earned more).
Privately-run labs were mostly funded by bulk-funded contracts which were set before the pay equity settlement and did not allow for big increases in wage costs, the company said.
Laboratory scientists and technicians went on strike in March over this pay gap.
Health NZ’s acting regional commissioner northern, Kate Dowson, said it was working with the laboratory to minimise the impact on referrers.
Dowson noted that Awanui Labs did not process urgent immunology samples such as measles, but provided urgent sample collection when requested by Public Health. These samples were usually processed by LabPlus, which is based at Auckland City Hospital.
Health NZ was “in regular dialogue” with Awanui regarding its cost pressures and sustainability.
Isaac Davison is an Auckland-based reporter who covers Auckland Issues. He joined the Herald in 2008 and has previously covered the environment, politics, social issues, and healthcare.
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