Pinecrest Healthcare's Onye Calls for Lab Quality Reforms

Mr. Chidoki Onye, the Managing Director of Pinecrest Healthcare, raised concerns about increasing laboratory errors in Nigeria, emphasizing the need for an urgent and comprehensive overhaul of Quality Assurance systems in medical laboratories. This statement was made during a press conference held via Zoom on Tuesday, ahead of the firm’s inaugural quality assurance summit.

The summit, themed ‘From bench to benchmark: Raising laboratory quality standards for patient care,’ is being hosted in collaboration with the global diagnostics company Bio-Rad. Onye warned that inaccurate diagnostic results pose significant risks to patient survival and effective healthcare delivery, noting that over 70 percent of clinical decisions rely on laboratory data.

He stressed that quality management should extend beyond mere compliance and should be integrated into the organizational culture to ensure patient safety. He stated that unreliable results can mislead clinicians, resulting in incorrect prescriptions, delayed interventions, and preventable deaths.