The 2nd July was the 183rd day of 2019, the mid-point of the year and the day after Phlebotomy Training Services’ 12th birthday, which our team celebrated by going to Durham to see West Indies V Sri Lanka in the ICC World Cup.
During the innings break, we got talking about which of our corporate clients we had worked with in the first half of the year.
We’ve been busy.
January saw us at Loughborough University for the seventh or eighth time, teaching phlebotomy and cannulation. Astonishingly, it was neither bitterly cold nor snowing – which it usually is when Phlebotomy Training Services visit!
In February, we were asked back to Covance contract researchers in Harrogate – a rare “home game” for us. Later in the month, we went up to Edinburgh to work with the Dermal Clinic, an aesthetic clinic who wanted to train their staff to take blood to extract platelet rich plasma (PRP) for use in treatments.
Phlebotomy Training Services work for lots of clients for whom confidentiality is important, but we have one client where it is paramount. As such, we returned to a “facility near Salisbury” for the fourth time in March – it always intrigues us when we work with researchers, but we feel exceptionally lucky to be working with this organisation – the scientists there are doing amazing things that no one knows about!
Towards the end of March, we had two fascinating days in Warrington teaching phlebotomy and point of care testing techniques to staff at Werfen who are worldwide leaders in in vitro diagnostics (IVD) in the specialties of Hemostasis, (that was where we came in) Acute Care Diagnostics, and Autoimmunity. They make machines that analyse blood and save lives.
April saw us jump on a plane from Manchester Airport and go out to Jersey to teach point of care testing techniques to staff of Family Nursing and Home Care, a Jersey charity providing integrated nursing and home care in the community. We’d never been to Jersey, but we’ll definitely be going back (with work or otherwise!) to have a proper look around – it’s lovely (but the traffic is awful!). No sooner had we got back from Jersey when we were off to Manchester Metropolitan University teaching PhD students and staff members to take blood to further their research projects.
In June, we taught two researchers from Edinburgh Napier University in Northallerton, before returning to Covance again and then driving down to The Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. Here, our phlebotomy course attendees were doctors who worked with women in ground close combat, training to take blood so that they can assess the impact that phlebotomy training has on them.
It has been a hectic 6 months – but we’ve enjoyed every minute of it, have met and taught some amazing people and wouldn’t have it any other way!