An internal audit found that the University of Iowa's State Hygienic Laboratory left as much as $1.1 million on the table, thanks to inconsistent billing and document collection, according to a Nov. 8 report in The Gazette.

An Arkansas man who owned and managed several diagnostic testing laboratories was indicted in an alleged $100 million fraudulent billing scheme, the Justice Department said Nov. 3. 

A joint venture between Los Angeles-based real estate firm Hatchspaces and Denver-based healthcare developer NexCore Group is building a life sciences wet lab in West Los Angeles, the companies said in a Nov. 3 news release.

The American Society for Clinical Pathology and the Joint Commission are kicking off a lab recognition program, the organizations said in an Oct. 27 news release.

Cambridge, Mass.-based blockchain platform Artifacts is partnering with South Bend, Ind.-based University of Notre Dame's Distributed Pharmaceutical Analysis Lab to combat the circulation of fake and substandard drugs, the university said in an Oct. 20 news release.

Nevada-based clinical laboratory MD Labs and two of its owners and co-founders will cumulatively pay between $11.6 million and $16 million to resolve allegations that they billed federal programs for medically unnecessary urine drug testing, according to a Justice Department statement.

Before the pandemic, many laboratories were already facing financial challenges due to severe downward pricing pressure caused by multi-year price cuts to the Medicare Part B clinical laboratory fee schedule.

An Oakdale, Minn. lab owned by Piscataway, N.J.-based Infinity BiologiX experienced an unspecified disruption in services over the weekend of Oct. 16-17, according to Saint Paul, Minn., ABC affiliate KSTP.

Jae Lee, former CEO of the now-defunct Northwest Physicians Laboratory in Bellevue, Wash., agreed to pay $1.1 million to resolve a civil case involving the lab allegedly offering referrals in exchange for cash payments, an arrangement commonly known as a kickback, according to a Justice Department news release.

A University of Illinois Chicago lab has been tracking COVID-19 in the city's wastewater and sharing the results with local public health agencies, according to WTTW.

Amazon Web Services, Pfizer, AstraZeneca and several other pharmacy and biotech leaders partnered to launch AION Labs, an innovative drug research project, AION Labs said Oct. 13.

Blacksburg-based Virginia Tech opened a 139,000-square-foot expansion in Roanoke that will house new lab facilities, the university said Oct. 12.

Secaucus, N.J.-based Quest Diagnostics opened its 250,000-square-foot lab in Clifton, N.J., the company said Oct. 12.

Psychiatrist Varanise Booker, MD, pleaded guilty to healthcare fraud in a kickback scheme for referring Medicare and Medicaid patients to the now-closed Universal Oral Fluid Labs in Greensburg, Pa., according to a Justice Department statement.

The Cleveland Clinic opened a two-story cryogenic biobank, the company said Oct. 7, in partnership with Chelmsford, Mass.-based Brooks Automation's life sciences division, now known as Azenta Life Sciences.

Phoenix-based genetic sequencing company Tesis Labs raised $20 million of growth equity financing, the company said Oct. 5. The funding round was led by an investment group headed by John Shufeldt, MD.

Two research teams have developed noninvasive tests that use blood or saliva samples to diagnose cases of colorectal cancer and prostate cancer.

The global direct-to-consumer lab test market is predicted to see 26 percent compound annual growth through 2031, according to a report by Albany, N.Y.-based Transparency Market Research. The growth will likely far outpace that of the overall clinical lab test market's, forecast at a 7.3 percent rate through 2028.

Welsh point-of-care testing company EKF Diagnostics is acquiring San Antonio-based Advanced Diagnostics Laboratory for $10 million in shares and additional performance-based payments of up to $60 million, the company said Sept. 29.

A new rapid test identifies severe COVID-19 patients more accurately than existing tests, researchers said Sept. 29 at the 2021 AACC Annual Scientific Meeting and Clinical Lab Expo in Atlanta.