Welcome to The Pathology Report!

Authors:  J. Buttivant, Dr. R. Kiehl, Dr. C. Cheung

Hi and welcome to “The Pathology Report!”

This blog has been set up to help you – as patients and other non-pathologists – see the world behind your test results. We want to help you understand the people, processes and systems that are in place to make sure that you get the right test, the right result in the right time.

Really, that’s our “bread and butter” but we want to make sure that you understand your tests results – and everything else that happens in a hospital laboratory – as clearly as possible. We think that’s the best way for you to make informed decisions about your care.

So, we’re pathologists and we work in, well, the pathology department.

The pathology department is part of the larger Laboratory Medicine Program (LMP) at the University Health Network (UHN) that includes Toronto General Hospital, Princess Margaret Hospital, Toronto Western Hospital and Toronto Rehab.

That means that pathologists support all our hospital sites across all of UHN and we’re all in the same department together.

With over 425 staff, including 60 medical and scientific staff, we are the largest diagnostic lab in Canada and one of the largest academic labs in the world.

What does all this mean?

Think about the last time you went to a hospital – did you have blood drawn? If so, that’s us! (Or more specifically, our hematology department.)

Did you have a lump and needed a biopsy? That’s us too! (Your sample was surely seen by one of our pathologists.)

Did you get a treatment plan from your doctor based on your genes? (Likely analyzed by one of our medical laboratory technologists.)That’s because of us too.

Laboratory medicine is the first stop for virtually all patients in Canadian hospitals – testing and diagnosis dictates the patient’s future treatment.

But, so much of this work happens behind the scenes. We want this blog to be a place where we pull back the curtain, go beyond the microscope and give you the full story, the complete “pathology report” on laboratory medicine at UHN.

Your care is important to us and we’re committed to being a global leader in clinical service – in addition to research and academics – so we think it’s important to learn about who is looking at your sample, who is analyzing your test and who is consulting with your oncologist, or other physician regarding pathology results.

We want you to understand who is caring for you, what’s happening and why it’s so important.

Posts on this blog will likely come from a small collection of pathologists at UHN, but over time you might here from others – including other colleagues within the LMP, such as hematologists and biochemists. We’re all in this together and we’re all committed to delivering the best care to our patients.

We’re excited to share our stories with you, but remember – the views expressed on this site belong to the authors and don’t necessarily represent those of UHN.