Last month the Rix Family Fund officially confirmed that it would support a new Donald B. Rix Professorship in Laboratory Quality in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine here at UBC. I think this is the first so named professorship in Canada.
Dr. Rix had a long interest in Laboratory Quality. When I first met him he was chairing an accreditation team for the College of American Pathologists monitoring laboratories in Washington state. I was a member of that team. Dr. Rix clearly brought to mind that accreditation was not just about doing the right thing in the right way, but more about doing it right because laboratories have customers including patients who count on the laboratory performance. It was a message that he brought to Metro McNair Laboratories in Vancouver and later to be LifeLabs.
“…accreditation… not just about doing the right thing in the right way, but more about doing it right because laboratories have customers including patients who count on the laboratory performance.”
Dr Rix was interested in the work being done here at CMPT in support of monitoring for performance and regularly attended our annual meetings. He also supported the UBC Program Office for Laboratory Quality Management (POLQM) with start-up funds that made the growth, development, and success of the UBC Certificate Course in Laboratory Quality Management possible.
Laurie Rix, his daughter, heads the Rix Family Fund and continues on the spirit of philanthropy in support of innovation and creativity. The Professorship in Laboratory Quality will start with two major assets, CMPT and POLQM which will provide a stable platform for education, research, and outreach.
The future position holders of this Professorship will have the mandate to grow the current programs through expanding the services currently being provided and developing new ones. They will also have the opportunity to collaborate with current and future partners in the expanding arena of laboratory quality and quality improvement.
We have seen from our current experiences, the need for additional research into the impacts of error, and we are convinced that the benefits from quality improvement will create opportunities for additional grant-funded research and development activities.
Dr. Michael Noble, CMPT and POLQM chair
