MLPAO CEO Michelle Hoad sits down with Christine Bruce, MHA(c), BHA, MLT, to discuss her experience as a woman in STEM. Currently working her dream job as Senior Director of the Laboratory Medicine Program at the University Health Network in Toronto, Christine discusses how she got into the medical laboratory field, her trajectory as a leader and some of the challenges and rewards of working in the lab.

Kelli-Ann Lemieux, MLT is a Northern Lab Leader. She speaks with Michelle Hoad, MLPAO CEO about her early interest in science, her trajectory as a laboratorian and a leader, and about the challenges and rewards of working in a lab.

This is a sponsored episode, part of our partnership with Johnson. Johnson is one of our incredible sponsors this year, helping the MLPAO provide learning and advocacy for our members, and they provide MLPAO members with really competitive insurance rates on insurance: for home, auto, personal liability, travel, health and dental, identity theft coverage, and more. Johnson has a long history as a partner of the MLPAO, dating back 25 years now. For this partnership podcast, we spoke with Johnson rep Yvonne McDougall-Brady about their commitment to professional associations, how they’ve changed the way they work to support healthcare professionals, and what Johnson benefits are available to you as an MLPAO member. We learned something new and we hope you will too.

From myths about how antibodies work to the accuracy of PCR, there are many misconceptions about vaccines, testing, and more. MLPAO CEO Michelle Hoad sat down with a panel of experts to discuss in-depth. She spoke with Dr. Zain Chagla, infectious diseases physician at St. Joseph's Healthcare in Hamilton; Dr. Rodney Rohde, Professor and Chair for the Clinical Laboratory Science (CLS) Program in the College of Health Professions at Texas State University; MLT Candy Rutherford, Technical Specialist Molecular Microbiology at Hamilton Health Sciences; and microbiologist and science educator Jason Tetro; to clear up some of the questions, misinformation, and inaccurate science around COVID-19 vaccines and laboratory testing.

This a sponsored episode, part of our partnership with Nova Biomedical. Nova is one of our incredible sponsors this year, helping the MLPAO provide learning and advocacy for our members. We took the opportunity of this partnership podcast to explore how a laboratory instrumentation developer works with labs. We spoke with their Global Sales Product Line Manager Brad Bullen about innovating in the pandemic, how they work with labs, and how medical laboratory professionals inspire what they do.

This month we’re featuring the shared Sinai Health/UHN microbiology lab. Their team went from 250,000 tests annually to providing an additional half a million COVID-19, as well as being the first lab to offer COVID-19 testing without PHOL confirmations in Ontario. If a lab is down for any reason or as backlogs increase, they have offered to shoulder the load and get Ontario back on track and have served Ontarians from Windsor to Niagara to Pembroke to Sioux Lookout and everywhere in between. We spoke with Dr. Tony Mazzulli, Microbiologist-in-Chief and Infectious Diseases Specialist, Christine Bruce, Senior Director, Laboratory Medicine Program, and Jessica Bourke, Lab Manager, about what they’ve seen change and what they hope for the future, one year and over 2 million COVID-19 tests later. Season 2 of the Dish focuses on how labs have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are rapidly ramping up testing and overcoming immeasurable odds testing for COVID-19, others are struggling or working on other testing while staff are re-deployed elsewhere. Join us as we follow one lab each month and explore how the pandemic is impacting labs across the province, from the patterns between to specific local situations.

This month we’re featuring Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. Their laboratory in northwestern Ontario is the only regional acute care hospital for 48% of Ontario’s land mass containing just 2% of the province’s population. Despite courier and inclement weather delays, distance from major centres, and critical staffing shortages, this group is dedicated and ready to deliver every day. Their team worked hard to bring COVID-19 RT-PCR testing on board on 3 separate platforms, mitigating supply chain issues and test kit shortages. We spoke with Georgia Carr - Manager, Laboratory Services, Jim Uliana, Senior Technologist, Biochemistry, and Lyllian Stavropoulos - Specimen Procurement & Dispatch Coordinator, about their reflections one year after the onset of the pandemic. Season 2 of the Dish focuses on how labs have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are rapidly ramping up testing and overcoming immeasurable odds testing for COVID-19, others are struggling or working on other testing while staff are re-deployed elsewhere. Join us as we follow one lab each month and explore how the pandemic is impacting labs across the province, from the patterns between to specific local situations.

This month, we're featuring the Hamilton Regional Laboratory Medicine Program (HRLMP). Although physically separated by site, the MLTs and MLAs in the Virology Laboratory and the MLAs in the St. Joseph's Hospital and Hamilton General Hospital Core Laboratories worked together to process and analyze approximately 1200 COVID samples per day from hospitals, external assessment centers, and overflow work from Public Health Ontario Laboratories. Their lab developed and implemented a lab-developed made-in-Hamilton COVID PCR and respiratory assays, and shared this and their technical expertise and assay with other laboratories across Ontario. Over Zoom, our CEO Michelle Hoad spoke with Paula Costa - MLA in the virology lab at SJHH, Candy Rutherford - MLT, Technical Specialist in Virology at SJHH, and Katerina Hynes - MLA in the core lab at HGH about the last 10 months fighting COVID-19. Season 2 of the Dish focuses on how labs have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are rapidly ramping up testing and overcoming immeasurable odds testing for COVID-19, others are struggling or working on other testing while staff are re-deployed elsewhere. Join us as we follow one lab each month and explore how the pandemic is impacting labs across the province, from the patterns between to specific local situations.

This month we’re featuring Health Sciences North/Horizon Santé-Nord in Sudbury. When COVID-19 arrived, they were sending specimens to Public Health Ontario which resulted in delayed turn around times for patients. They began testing their own patients on April 13th, reducing turn around times by more than 30 hours in the first week of testing. They are now a regional testing site for samples collected from North Bay to Wawa and all points between. Working together, they advanced Laboratory Information Systems, testing procedures, reporting structures and more, with everyone on the team bringing new ideas to the table to cope with the added volume. It has been an incredible act of teamwork--we spoke with Admin Director MLT Erin Tarini, MLT Brandi Marshall and MLA/T Monique Gagnon about what it has looked like, coming together to test for COVID-19. Season 2 of the Dish focuses on how labs have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are rapidly ramping up testing and overcoming immeasurable odds testing for COVID-19, others are struggling or working on other testing while staff are re-deployed elsewhere. Join us as we follow one lab each month and explore how the pandemic is impacting labs across the province, from the patterns between to specific local situations.

In January, the EORLA Regional Virology Laboratory at CHEO in Ottawa was a little lab with 10 staff working mostly days. With the onset of the pandemic they've rapidly expanded to a group of 30 lab professionals working 24/7 on PCR testing. They transformed the lab quickly to perform approximately 10% of all COVID-19 testing in Ontario. Their team has processed as many tests in the last 6 months as they normally would in 5 years. Our CEO Michelle Hoad sat down to speak with Microbiologist Dr. Leanne Mortimer, Sr. MLT Soni Rousseau and Bench MLT, Virology Michelle Gagnon to hear how they worked together to validate and set up the lab. +++ Season 2 of The Dish focuses on how labs have responded to the COVID-19 pandemic. Some are rapidly ramping up testing and overcoming immeasurable odds testing for COVID-19, others are struggling or working on other testing while staff are re-deployed elsewhere. Join us as we follow one lab each month and explore how the pandemic is impacting labs across the province, from the patterns between to specific local situations.

The MLPAO is so excited to welcome Ances Hercules to the team as our new Director, Professional Services. Ances is a passionate cMLA/T^MLPAO with a specialization in paediatric patient care. Ances will be providing oversight of the MLPAO’s programs to ensure that a member centered approach is embedded in all aspects of our association services. She will bring her strong constellation of experience as an MLA/T, politician, and educator to the MLPAO’s certification, publication, promotions, and advocacy initiatives.

CEO Michelle Hoad speaks to Jeff Sammut SXM Canada Talks about the importance of med lab professions during this pandemic.

The team fighting COVID-19 is a big one, but medical laboratory professionals are at the epicenter: conducting tests and confirming new cases. In this special episode of The Dish, MLPAO CEO Michelle Hoad speaks with Christine Bruce, Administrative Director for the Microbiology Laboratory at UHN and Mount Sinai Hospital in Toronto, ON about the lab's role in fighting the outbreak, what happens after a sample is taken from a patient, precautions in the lab, and shortages of lab staff. If you're a medical laboratory professional, share this with your networks to raise awareness about your work to diagnose and track COVID-19. #medlabthx #ONlabforthepeople

Episode 6 marks our final episode of the series: we speak with Deanne Cianfagna and Mary Louise Petersen, two MLTs working on the front lines at Thunder Bay Regional Health Sciences Centre. Cianfagna and Petersen speak with us about the shortage: first warning signs, training under stress, automation and amalgamation, and impact for MLTs as individuals and professionals. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, medical laboratory professionals working on the ground, and many more stories from the shortage.

Our first Dish of the new year is with Bradley Hann, Program Coordinator and Educator at Cambrian College in Sudbury. If you look at a map of all the MLT schools in Ontario, Cambrian is a lone school serving all of Ontario’s North. Hann speaks with us about the implications of this for recruiting, clinical placements, rural and remote laboratories, and education as the shortage increases across the province. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, MLTs and MLA/Ts working on the ground, and many more stories from the frontlines of the shortage.

December's Dish is with Sarah James, a Pathologists' Assistant who has since 2017 been the Quality Manager for a partnership of 10 labs separated by 700 km in Northern Ontario, 2 of which are fully Point of Care Testing. James speaks to us about patterns she's noticing across the labs she works in and how the shortages are impacting quality management. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, MLTs and MLA/Ts working on the ground, and many more stories from the frontlines of the shortage.

We speak with EORLA's Greg Doiron, VP Operations and Manager and Anas Gharra, Laboratory Manager about patterns in their laboratory networks, what it means to work in a rural lab, and systems changes that would shift learning and clinical placements to address the crisis. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, MLTs and MLA/Ts working on the ground, and many more stories from the frontlines of the shortage.

October's Dish is with Sault Area Hospital's Manda Rivers, Laboratory Services Manager and Betty Currie, Technical Supervisor. They spoke with us about recruitment challenges in Northern Ontario, impacts of shortages in their lab, and possible ways to move forward. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, MLTs and MLA/Ts working on the ground, and many more stories from the frontlines of the shortage. This episode has a few small edits and replaces the one uploaded on October 9.

This first Dish is with Michelle Hoad, the MLPAO’s CEO. She has been working closely with focus groups of MLTs and MLA/Ts, laboratory directors, educational institutions, consultants, and Queen’s Park to define the shortage and come up with possible solutions. This season we are focusing on an issue which impacts all of us here in Ontario: an impending medical laboratory staffing crisis. We’ll hear from small laboratories in rural and remote areas, lab managers preparing for shifting workforces, advocacy groups approaching the province to address the crisis, MLTs and MLA/Ts working on the ground, and many more stories from the frontlines of the shortage.