In recent years a great deal of interest has been aroused in individuals looking to investigate their DNA. They do so to find out their ancestry, and thanks to modern technology, it can even be done by post! How is this so? It’s down to laboratories working with companies to develop medical kits that can be sent by post, and returned to the lab for analysis.
This is not only done for DNA, as there are certain conditions in which home testing can be successful. The problem is that anyone wanting to offer such a service needs to be able to offer reliable and proven medical kits that are easy for the layman to use, and that provide accurate results to within the required and accepted tolerances.
As this is a relatively new area of commerce, there are a few companies that are providing custom-designed medical kits, but the market is sure to grow as the convenience of home testing becomes more recognised. So, what is the process behind getting your own custom medical kits designed and delivered, and how do you go about it?
Custom Medical Kits
Who needs custom medical kits? There are many potential users such as genetic and clinical labs, microbiology labs and more, and the convenience of being able to send kits to either patients, other labs or hospitals is not to be overlooked. There are companies such as Strategic Lab Partners who specialise in this area. Let’s use a DNA kit as an example to see how it works.
The first step is you – the customer – contacting the medical kit company and talking to them about your requirements. They will then design the kit for you, or you can work with their designers to come to a finished item that meets your approval. They then send you a full, physical mock-up of the kit. This will be an accurate representation of what you will get from the production run.
Once you approve the mock-up, they will perform a trial run, in order to ensure that everything fits in place and production is smooth, and following this, the kit goes into full production. How long this process takes depends not only on the company you choose – for example, Strategic Lab Partners say they can being production 21 days after approval of the mock-up, others may be sooner or later – and on the quantity you need to produce, and all of this will be discussed and agreed during the initial consultation process.
Further Services
It is important that, if you are looking for custom medical kits, you find a supplier who can follow the process through from initial conversation to delivery and transit, with all stages monitored accurately including order fulfilment, and delivery confirmation. Logistics is a big part of the process, and this will be handled by the supplier in most cases.
Of course, as we said earlier on, it is not just DNA testing kits that can be provided this way. Toxicology samples, for example, can also be sent for laboratory analysis in this manner, and such methods are becoming more popular thanks to the cost and time savings for those involved.
As this is a medical process, it is important that you find a supplier that is licenced and that has proven track record, as you need to be certain that accuracy and security will be paramount. This fast-growing, relatively new area of medical testing is one that will become more prevalent in time, so talk to the right people now and start building a relationship for the future.