Dr Lal PathLabs is gearing up to tap a share of the diagnostic outsourcing market opportunities from US. In a recent interaction with medical centres in the US, a lot of interest was evinced for looking at India as a contract lab-diagnostic destination.
"We are convinced that our lab facilities, services and test reports are on par with international standards and a section of US medical centres which discussed with us have been satisfied in terms of our infrastructure and offerings. Before outsourcing begins, stringent onsite inspection will be made to endorse our competence. We have the capability and the capacity to tap the lab diagnostics space", Dr Arvind Lal, chairman and managing director, told Pharmabiz.
Efforts are on to gear up its infrastructure in terms of new facility and expansion. It has invested Rs 20 crore to set up Asia's largest lab at New Delhi, which will provide all diagnostic offerings under one roof. The Path Labs has the National Laboratory Grid (NLG) connected via satellite to integrate the entire network of its existing labs across the country resulting in complex hands-off operations and error free results, sources said.
The US and many other countries in the South East Asian region view India as a cost-competitive hub for lab diagnostics. From the US specifically, the opportunities for Indian diagnostic labs are not just in the area of basic tests but cancer markers, molecular diagnostics and high-end investigations, he noted.
Being in the business for the last 57 years, Dr Lal Path Labs is India's largest and oldest private pathology lab with a range of 1,600 different tests catering to over 6,000 patients in a day, which amounts to 1.5 million annually through its 20 labs in 400 cities.
Recently in Bangalore, the Karnataka health and family welfare minister R Ashok inaugurated Dr Lal PathLabs Diagnostic Centre. The lab major invested Rs 2 crore for its 21st facility, which will also offer home tests apart from advanced cardiology, radiology, bone densitometry tests among others. It is equipped with not only automated instrumentation but also bi-directional interface, which ensure error free diagnosis in the shortest possible time.
Currently, in India out of the one-lakh diagnostic labs in the country, only 40 are accredited and around 65 have applied for the certification. "The reason for only a handful of labs being certified is attributed to two reasons namely: no diagnostic laboratory regulations in place and a serious lack of awareness," pointed out Dr Arvind Lal.
The US-based Asiatic Research has already accorded Dr Lal PathLabs the status of the number one laboratory in India. Further, six out the 20 Dr Lal Path Labs in the country are NABL certified. It is also one of the three in the country with a CAP (College of American Pathologists) certification after Biocon's clinical research arm, Clinigene International Pvt. Ltd. and SRL Ranbaxy.