Medlab bows out after 45 years

LAWRENCE GULLERY
Some laughs and old stories will be shared tonight when Medlab Hawke's Bay staff gather to mark the end of the medical service's 45-year reign in the region.
Medlab's contract with the Hawke's Bay District Health Board (HBDHB), its primary customer since the 1960s, expires today and the medical lab service was to close its doors for the last time this afternoon.
Laboratory services will be jointly provided by the HBDHB and Southern Community Laboratories Hawke's Bay (SCL) from tomorrow. SCL will fulfil the laboratory contract for the next five years.
Lab testing will still be available from Napier, Hastings, Havelock North, Taradale, Central Hawke's Bay and Wairoa. There was initial concern Medlab Hawke's Bay's extensive patient database would be lost when the service closed today but chief executive Bruce van den Heever said that information would still be accessible to doctors through the service's Palmerston North site.
"We need to keep that information available to people," he said.
Staff were sad and, over the past week, most had "quietly resigned" to the fact the service was closing.
He said the process had been happening for some time but he thought the inevitability of it had started to dawn on people.
It was hard to say exactly how many of the 50 staff would be out of work, he said. The majority had employment with SCL and the Hawke's Bay Hospital. Others had moved out of the medical lab industry to find work.
Mr van den Heever said relocation to Medlab's other sites in Masterton, Palmerston North or Gisborne were options for staff but many weren't in a position to move town.
Mr van den Heever has worked at Medlab Hawke's Bay since 1995 and will remain with the service, probably working from the Masterton site.
"I will certainly miss the staff that I have worked with, the general practitioners and, most of all, I will miss Hawke's Bay," he said.
Staff were gathering this afternoon for a special function at Medlab Hawke's Bay's Heretaunga Street site in Hastings. "No doubt there will be many people that will want to get up to speak, there will be memorabilia and laughs."
Mr van den Heever said staff wanted to thank the public for sending letters and notes wishing them well for the future. "We've been inundated with letters of support, thanking us for our service and we just want to show our gratitude for that," he said.
"We are also indebted to our staff, who have shown their loyalty to the company, and the general practitioners have also supported us right up to the last day."
The buildings housing Medlab Hawke's Bay's sites in Hastings, Havelock North, Napier and Waipukurau were owned by various business owners in the region. Mr van den Heever said it was likely the owners would look for other commercial operators to take over use of the buildings.