The Dubbo community is a step closer to a new, expanded NSW Health Pathology laboratory, with construction work now underway on the $6 million facility.

The project will deliv­er a larg­er, more mod­ern pathol­o­gy depart­ment to meet the grow­ing health needs of the Dub­bo community.

The new lab­o­ra­to­ry will ensure NSW Health Pathol­o­gy staff can access fit-for-pur­pose facil­i­ties, includ­ing mod­ern, auto­mat­ed test­ing platforms.

As part of NSW Health Pathology’s com­mit­ment to envi­ron­men­tal sus­tain­abil­i­ty, the Dub­bo lab­o­ra­to­ry has also been select­ed for a pilot project to install sen­sor taps to con­serve water and sup­port ener­gy efficiency.

Lab­o­ra­to­ry Man­ag­er Monique Mintern said the sus­tain­abil­i­ty pilot project will be a wel­come addition.

“The sus­tain­abil­i­ty of sen­sor taps is sig­nif­i­cant,” Ms Mintern said.

“They cre­ate a hygien­ic and safe envi­ron­ment, reduc­ing the chances of cross-con­t­a­m­i­na­tion in the lab­o­ra­to­ry while also con­serv­ing water.

“Our local com­mu­ni­ty here in Dub­bo has lived through many years of drought and we appre­ci­ate how pre­cious our local water sup­ply is.”

NSW Health Pathol­o­gy has award­ed the $6 mil­lion con­tract to North Con­struc­tion and Build­ing fol­low­ing a com­pet­i­tive ten­der process.

North Man­ag­ing Direc­tor Matthew Cook said North will work along­side NSW Pub­lic Works to refur­bish the for­mer ambu­la­to­ry care sec­tion of the hos­pi­tal which will house the new pathol­o­gy laboratory.

“North has a long his­to­ry of not only deliv­er­ing essen­tial med­ical facil­i­ties for NSW Health but also work­ing col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly with NSW Pub­lic Works to bring these, and oth­er, projects to fruition through­out region­al NSW,” Mr Cook said.

“Our local team of experts is look­ing for­ward to com­plet­ing these much-need­ed upgrades for the staff, patients and broad­er community.”

Con­struc­tion work is due to be com­plet­ed in late 2024. The exist­ing pathol­o­gy lab­o­ra­to­ry will con­tin­ue to oper­ate while the new lab­o­ra­to­ry is built.

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