Resource Centre

On 13 August 2020, this COVID-19 ECHO session was convened to discuss optimization of diagnostic networks and their key role in responding to COVID-19. Optimised national diagnostic networks are key to increasing access to high-quality diagnostics. With the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, some sub-Saharan African countries leveraged more than a decade of investments in… Read More

In July of 2019, the World Health Organization and the African Society for Laboratory Medicine organized a meeting with countries and key stakeholders in diagnostics to discuss and find concrete ways to improve and increase access to integrated multiplex technologies and determine how they can be translated into public health policy that impacts global impact.

The May 2020 Waste Management training session focused on SARS-CoV-2 laboratory biosafety guidance and featured the presentation of David Bressler, Health Scientist and Microbiologist at the International Laboratory Branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Nearly all countries are scaling up COVID-19 testing as one of the main strategies to eliminate the… Read More

The March 2020 waste management training session focused on Hologic’s Best Practices for Waste Handling. Todd Richmond of Hologic, shared his experiences, expertise and advice on the waste and contamination management of Hologic’s Panther. In collaboration with the African Society for Laboratory Medicine (ASLM) and the LabCoP community, the CDC International Laboratory Branch (ILB) offers… Read More

In this session, colleagues from Kenya shared findings from the assessment of waste handling practices in their viral load (VL) and Early infant diagnosis (EID) laboratories. They discussed contextual issues in regard to VL & EID laboratory testing capacity and networks, laboratory self-assessment using a VL & EID customized assessment checklist, findings/results, lessons learnt, challenges… Read More

The November 2019 Waste Management training session focused on the perspectives of Abbott Laboratories’ Best Practices for Waste Handling. Delfin Rubin, Global Product Manager of HIV Care for Infectious Disease Emerging Markets at Abbott Rapid Diagnostics, and Ami Soni, EHS Lead for Abbott Molecular describe the constituents of their HIV rapid point-of-care diagnostics, such as… Read More

The purpose of this tool is to assist in identifying gaps and creating awareness of best practices for waste management processes in viral load (VL) and early infant diagnosis (EID) molecular testing laboratories (and associated healthcare facilities), in order to provide a starting point for assistance in waste mitigation strategies. This tool is for completion… Read More

In October 2019 the LabCoP stakeholders met in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia to convene the 2019 Face-to-Face meeting. It was co-convened by ASLM and the World Health Organization to enable countries to objectively assess their progress towards the improvement of the viral load testing (VLT) cascade, consolidate the implementation of interventions, enhance collaboration with civil society… Read More

WHO has produced a biosafety video series entitled, “Good Microbiological Practice and Procedures (GMPP)”, which is central to the WHO Laboratory Biosafety Manual (LBM4) being revised and finalised. These seven training videos will help enhance the safety of any health laboratory, including those in resource-limited settings.

With limited funding for global health, identifying practical, cost and time-saving solutions, while also ensuring quality of care is increasingly important. One approach to increasing access to point-of-care (POC) testing is integrated testing (a term often used interchangeably with “multi-disease testing”), which tests for different conditions or diseases using the same diagnostic platform. This brief… Read More

In this session we focused on the issues of policy, legal and regulatory frameworks for waste management, using an example from South Africa. This session underscored the fact one of the common noted challenges in many settings was that there were and still are limited or no existing national policies or guidelines on dealing with… Read More

This HIV viral load (VL) testing cascade self-assessment scorecard and user guide is used by the LabCoP country teams to identify critical gaps in their laboratory systems and assess the status of the different thematic areas of the VL cascade and their testing services to help identify opportunities for improvement. It was designed by the… Read More

This Waste Management session covered updates to the checklist for assessments of viral load (VL) and early infant diagnosis (EID) testing laboratories and associated healthcare facilities. David Bressler, MS, CBSP (SM) NRM of the International Laboratory Branch, CDC, Division of Global HIV and TB presented to the audience about the checklist/tool and its ability to… Read More

This course provides key information on safe practices, infection control, personal protective equipment, pre- and post-exposure prophylaxis, and ways to manage and dispose of health care waste properly. The goal is to familiarize Clinical health care workers with proper safety practices and help them: Protect themselves and their coworkers Protect patients and clients Protect the… Read More

In the May 2019 session, Dr Katrina Sleeman, Associate Service Fellow in the Viral Load/Early Infant Diagnosis Team at the CDC ILB introduced a draft of a viral load WM checklist tool that can be used as baseline audit of select country VL labs. The tool aims to assist in creating awareness of best practices… Read More

In collaboration with ASLM and the LabCoP community, the CDC International Laboratory Branch (ILB) presented an overview of the World Health Organization (WHO) Publication: ‘Safe Management of Wastes from Health-Care Activities’ during the second ECHO session dedicated to waste management. This document, developed by WHO in 2017, highlights the key aspects of safe healthcare waste… Read More

In collaboration with the African Society for Laboratory Medicine (ASLM) and the LabCoP community, the CDC International Laboratory Branch (ILB) presented the first session in a series of ECHO sessions dedicated to waste management. In this session we reviewed waste management practices at the country level using the responses to the November 2018 LabCoP Waste… Read More

This document, developed by the World Health Organization (WHO) in 2017, highlights the key aspects of safe healthcare waste management in order to guide policymakers, practitioners and facility managers to improve such services in healthcare facilities. It is based on the comprehensive WHO handbook ‘Safe Management of Wastes from Health-Care Activities’ (WHO, 2014), and also… Read More

The waste produced in the course of healthcare activities, from contaminated needles to radioactive isotopes, can cause infection and injury. Inadequate waste management is likely to have serious public health consequences and deleterious effects on the environment. The resources linked here and this downloadable handbook published by the World Health Organization (2014), provide comprehensive guidance… Read More

LabCoP has updated the Decision-Making Matrix that outlines strategic areas, strategic options, and priority action items for improvement in seven focus areas within the viral load (VL) cascade and across diseases, including demand creation, results utilization, waste management and biosafety, network optimization, monitoring and evaluation, quality management system, and access to essential diagnosis. This matrix… Read More