Outpatient lab services moving to Kincardine hospital from medical clinic

If you've been having your blood work done at the Hawthorne Community Clinic in Kincardine, you will have to switch gears, as that service will be moving to the Kincardine hospital next week.

A press release from the South Bruce Grey Health Centre (which includes hospitals in Kincardine, Walkerton, Chesley and Durham), issued Monday, states that beginning Monday, Sept. 21, outpatient laboratory services will move to the Kincardine hospital from the medical clinic.

A new location, just inside the main entrance of the hospital, has been created for the community lab collections service.

As of June 1, appointments are required for this service. They can be booked by calling patient registration at the hospital, 519-396-3331, Ext. 0, from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m.

“The South Bruce Grey Health Centre is changing outpatient lab providers in Kincardine to Dynacare from Life Labs, to ensure consistency across all four hospital sites,” says health centre president and chief executive officer Michael Barrett. “The Walkerton, Chesley and Durham sites are currently serviced by Dynacare. With this change in Kincardine, we are moving the location of outpatient services to the hospital from the medical clinic.”

The transition of outpatient lab services to private labs was one of the budget recovery strategies implemented by the health centre last year, as private providers, such as Life Labs and Dynacare, are funded by the government for outpatient lab testing, whereas the health centre is not.

Kincardine was the first site to transition to a private lab in March, 2019, when it moved to Life Labs. The Chesley, Durham and Walkerton sites transitioned to Dynacare in July, 2019.