Presentations attended related to laboratory management:

PathCape 2018

• Accreditation, Quality and Leadership – Prof A Zemlin – PathCape 17 August 2018
• Error Free Lab Work: Is it an achievable target? – Prof Yenice (Turkey) – PathCape 17 August 2018
• P4P (pay for performance) in Laboratory Medicine – Dr Orth (Germany) – PathCape 17 August 2018
• Accreditation – Prof Zima (Czech Republic) – PathCape 17 August 2018

Laboratory management course – University of Stellenbosch 02-05 November 2020

The laboratory management course which I attended through Stellenbosch University was an exciting experience. Although during COVID times, it wasn’t necessarily a trip to Stellenbosch where one could have a glas of wine at a local wine farm afterwards, but nonetheless it was an amazing experience. I have made friends with colleagues in other Pathology disciplines remotely and we needed to prepare a Strategic Business Plan and present it at the end of the course.

All talks attended were focussed on laboratory management. The skills learnt during this course will likely still bring much joy and productivity into my work life in future and the tools learnt to properly manage a laboratory are of enormous value.

There were tasks from as simple as a left-right quizz, to a QC workshop for our chemical pathology registrars with Levy-Jennings chart interpretation and the lot. Some of the most enjoyable topics for me were: Adding value to lab medicine, a topic often focussed on by Prof Annie Zemlin, effective laboratory leadership, focussed on by Prof Rajiv Erasmus, an effective laboratory leader in Chemical Pathology and the topic on Risk management by Prof Preiser. Together these topics which were presented (see below) made up an astounding course which brought together a few aspects rarely covered by other lecturers or even reading material elsewhere. This is what makes this course a must for future laboratory leaders.

Day 1 – 02 November 2020
Talk 1 – Leadership Skills For Effective Laboratory Management – Mandela’s Lessons – Prof RT Erasmus
Talk 2 – Laboratory Organization – Best Practice – Dr Z Chapanduka
Talk 3 – Ethical Leadership – Prof RT Erasmus
Talk 4 – Strategy And Leadership Strategic And Goal Planning For Effective Laboratory Management – Prof RT Erasmus
Talk 5 – Budget And Introduction Of New Tests – Prof AE Zemlin
Talk 6 – Laboratory Safety – Prof TS Pillay

Day2 – 03 November 2020
Talk 1 – Leading And Managing Change In The Laboratory – Prof G van Zyl
Talk 2 – Leadership And Diversity – Prof AE Zemlin
Talk 3 – Preventing And Managing Conflict In The Laboratory – Prof Schneider
Talk 4 – Risk Management In The Diagnostic Laboratory – Prof W Preiser
Talk 5 – POPIA For The Healthcare Professional – Dr C Swanepoel
Talk 6 – EBLM and Audit – Dr T Jalavu

Day3 – 04 November 2020
Talk 1 – Use Of Quality Management Tools To Assess And Improve Quality – Prof A Whitelaw
Talk 2 – Iso 15189 And Preparing The Lab For Accreditation – Prof AE Zemlin
Talk 3 – Non-Conformances & Document Control – Dr AA Khine
Talk 4.1 – Lean Management And Quality – Dr AA Khine
Talk 4.2 – Six Sigma Approach To Quality – Dr AA Khine
Talk 5 – Managing A POCT Service – Prof A Whitelaw
Talk 6 – Method Validation – Dr M Hoffmann
Talk 7 – Extra-Analytical Errors – Dr E Kruger

Day4 – 05 November 2020
Talk 1 – Harmonization, Standardization And Traceability – Dr T Jalavu
Talk 2 – Electronic Gatekeeping – Dr H Vreede
Talk 3 – Medico-legal aspects of laboratory practice and maintenance of the chain of evidence – Prof J Dempers
Talk 4 – Autoverification – Dr H Vreede
Talk 5 – Demand Management – Prof AE Zemlin
Talk 6 – Uncertainty Of Measurement – Dr E Kruger

At the Laboratory Management course, attended virtually at the University of Stellenbosch, our task was to give a presentation of our business plan.

The task was as follows:

You are the head of an accredited academic pathology laboratory (you have to annually sustain its accreditation status) at a large 1000 bed teaching hospital in one of the developing countries in Africa. You are in charge of providing laboratory tests to a population of 3 million people who are spread out (large urban and rural pockets). In addition to providing a comprehensive tertiary quality service you also teach undergraduate students and train postgraduate specialists. One of your other duties is to carry out research and ensure research outputs that are of international standard as well as supervise postgraduate students and apply for large grants to support these projects. Your academic laboratory closely works with the medical faculty and the Medical Research Council of your country. There are 2 private pathology laboratories who also compete with your laboratory for proving a service. You are also expected to provide community services and cover the province in which your laboratory is located. As part of the 5 year service and academic plan you have been asked to develop a strategic plan for your department for the next five years. Your team will present this plan for discussion and approval
You are divided into 5 groups. Each group will make a presentation at the end of the course on Thursday afternoon (05/11/2020) and your presentation will be assessed. Each presentation will last for 20 mins and will take the form of a group presentation in which all members of your group will present various aspects of the strategic plan. Group discussion time must be used for this activity.

GROUP ASSIGNMENT, DISCUSSION AND FINAL PRESENTATION

We were a multi-disciplinary team, consisting of 2 Chemical Pathology registrars, a Hematology registrar as well as a Histopathology registrar. This task was taken on with great enthusiasm and the presentation received positive feedback. See downloadable pdf version of the presentation below: