Haematology

Overview of Laboratory Services

The Haematology Cluster Melaka Pathology Service provides diagnostic and consultative services for patient management in Hospital Melaka, Hospital Alor Gajah, Hospital Jasin, other government hospitals and health clinics in Melaka. It operates 24 hours daily including weekends and public holidays.

Dr. Azlinda Abu Bakar

Head of Unit

Services

The diagnostic services are divided into: -

Routine Tests : All haematology tests that are offered during and after office hours.
Specialized Tests : Tests offered during office hours only. Some of the tests require approval by the Pathologists or need an appointment from the laboratory (please refer to the tests list).
Referred Tests : Haematology Laboratory will handle the specimens for all listed referral tests and the specimens must arrive to the laboratory on Monday and Wednesday during office hours

Hours of Service

24 hours daily including weekends and public holidays.

On-call Medical Officer and Pathologist are available for clinical consultation or assistance and Scientific Officers are available for technical consultation after office hours, contactable via hand phone or by hospital telephone operator.

List of Test

Test offered can be found here.

Critical Result Values

Critical result values can be found here.

STAT / Urgent Test Service

Details on STAT / Urgent Service and TAT can be found here.

Pre-Analytical Requirements

Information on Pre-Analytical Requirements can be found here.

Request Forms

All in-house test requests must use PER-PAT 301.
All referral tests must use the respective request forms according to the tests and referral centre (please refer to the test lists).
Additional verbal requests using existing primary specimens shall be followed by new request form with details of requester, date and time of request. Acceptance of this requests are subjected to specimen stability or according to unit criteria.

Request forms can be downloaded here.

Specimen Collection

General Specimen Collection and Handling

Most of the tests use venous blood samples.
To ensure consistent and accurate result:
- Strictly follow the volume of blood required for each test specified on the label or fill the blood sample to the mark on the label.
- Inaccurate blood volume will result in pseudo polycythemia, pseudo thrombocytopenia, and pseudo leukopenia low hematocrit, low MCV, and a high MCHC. Coagulation tests will give falsely prolonged result.
To prevent haemolysis:
- Avoid vigorous mixing.
- Send the specimen to the laboratory as soon as possible.
- Haemolysed specimen will give erroneous result.
Avoid clot formation by:
- Ensuring a smooth venapuncture and steady flow of blood into the syringe.
- Introducing the blood into the anticoagulant tube as soon as the blood has been drawn.
- Mix immediately by gently inverting the tube at least 4 - 8 times.
- Clotted specimen will cause cell damage and the consumption of coagulation factors, thus it will give errorneous result in FBC and coagulation profile.
Sample must be sent within 4 hours of blood collection for coagulation tests.
FBC for cold AIHA patient and specimen for cryoglobulin test: Please collect pre-warm specimen tube, syringe and needle from the laboratory.
PT/INR/APTT for polycthaemic specimen: Please collect specimen tube (with adjusted volume of anticoagulant) from the laboratory.