Merry Christmas and all the best for 2011

(Inside Aotea, December 2010)

It has been our privilege taking care of your pathology needs this year and we trust you have been pleased with the quality of our care and medical advice.

It is important to us that our services provide you with the medical care you need in an environment that is friendly and professional.

We have recently surveyed patients to find out just what many of you think about our services, and we will be analysing the results carefully to see where you think we can improve our services to you next year and beyond.

Naturally, if you have views or feedback you would like to share with us on your treatment here, please contact our staff at any time. You do not need to wait for our annual survey!

Apart from focusing on professional and caring face-to-face medical service, we also make it a priority to ensure our infrastructure is up to scratch and we invest regularly in new technology. We want our staff to have the best tools possible to do their jobs well. This year, for example, we have introduced a digital cervical scanning service and we are just completing an electronic ordering system to make it easier for your doctor to request your tests.

We also put in a lot of good, old-fashioned hard work every day to keep our services running well. It might surprise you to know, for instance, that our courier drivers each day visit medical centres and clinics 275 times and drive more than 1600 kilometres to pick up patient specimens.

We have one year left of our contract with the local District Health Boards. We are currently working with them to establish whether we can secure a further contract to continue being your community pathology provider

Our belief is that the quality of our services and our commitment to ongoing improvement stand us in good stead to secure that contract.

Your feedback is an important tool to help guide us in planning for that future.

Best wishes for 2011.

Dr Karen Wood

Chief Executive Aotea Pathology