Laboratory Service

The lab serves two audiences with the same equipment and staff. For residents on the wards, samples are drawn where they lie — a fasting glucose or an HbA1c does not require a taxi ride, a wait in a diagnostic centre lobby, and a resident back on the ward tired before the day starts. For families in the neighbourhood, the lab is a walk-in point for the routine work that fits the day: a blood test on the way to work, a report picked up on the way home. That second use is deliberate — a care home with a working ward-standard lab has capacity most days, and running it as a neighbourhood service keeps the equipment busy and the pricing honest.

The in-house menu covers what most families and residents need routinely: blood chemistry (glucose, kidney and liver panels, electrolytes), CBC, lipid profiles, HbA1c, urine analysis, and microbiological cultures. Specialized panels — hormone assays, tumour markers, less common serology — go out to partner reference labs, but the family only comes to one place: sample given at Naman, report back at Naman. Nobody is running between three collection points for a single prescription.

On turnaround times, straight answers work better than promises. Most routine chemistry, CBC, and urine reports are same-day. Microbiological cultures need 48 to 72 hours because the organism has to grow before it can be identified. Specialized panels sent to reference labs are typically 3 to 7 days depending on the test — we tell you the specific number when the sample is received, not a blanket estimate. When a result is clinically urgent (a critically low haemoglobin, a K+ out of range), we call the referring doctor or the family the same day rather than waiting for a scheduled pickup.

Practical points, so the visit does not need a second phone call: a prescription or referral note is welcome if you have one, but not required for standard walk-in tests. Fasting instructions — how many hours, water permitted or not — are given on the booking call for tests that need them. Both branches accept lab work. And a note of scale: this is a working care-home lab, not a large diagnostic chain. For anything beyond standard blood, urine, and culture work, call us first — we will tell you honestly whether it's better done here or at a specialized centre.