ROSEAU, MN, SEPTEMBER 15TH — On Friday, September 11th, LifeCare Medical Center received notification from the Mayo Clinic Laboratories that seven false positive results were reported for COVID-19 tests collected at LifeCare Medical Center. Upon receiving this news, a team of LifeCare administration called each of those seven patients immediately to notify them of their false test result.
“It was extremely important for us to quickly notify these patients of the false positive tests. The COVID-19 samples were processed at Mayo Clinic Laboratories between the dates of August 30th and September 4th,” said Kelly Hulst, RN, LifeCare Director of Quality and Performance Improvement.
Once a COVID-19 patient test sample is collected at LifeCare Medical Center, the standard procedure is to send it to Mayo Clinic Laboratories for processing.
The false tests were a result of a quality issue in the testing reagent while processed at Mayo Clinic Laboratories. LifeCare Medical Center was one of a number of MN health care facilities who were notified of false positives due to this situation. Mayo Clinic Laboratories is working with the manufacturer to determine the exact cause of this quality issue.
“This is an unfortunate circumstance that has affected our communities in many ways. Although out of our control, we are sincerely apologetic to any and all who were affected by this situation. We remain confident with the Mayo Clinic Laboratories as they perform over 10,000 PCR COVID-19 tests per day. We will continue to utilize them as our primary laboratory for COVID-19 testing,” says Keith Okeson, LifeCare President and CEO.
On September 15th, 2020, Julie Breider, MT (ASCP), Regional Service Representative at Mayo Clinic Laboratories stated, “Mayo Clinic Laboratories take great pride in delivering the best quality of laboratory medicine for our patients. Although occurrences such as this are rare, we recognize that they can affect patient care and therefore take this manufacturer-related recall seriously. We will continue to hold our vendors to the high standard of quality that you expect.”
“LifeCare employees follow all guidelines set forth by the MDH when performing these tests. Through our investigation, this was not a result of a quality issue from LifeCare Medical Center. This is an evolving situation and we look forward to receiving additional information from Mayo and MDH,” says Okeson.
Last modified: 09/15/2020
