On the morning of September 18 in Hanoi, Bach Mai Hospital held the first scientific conference of its Institute of Medical Testing. As part of the event, the US government donated testing equipment to the hospital.
Pierce Davis, Political Affairs Counselor at the US Embassy in Vietnam, said the equipment handed over was a DNA sequencing system, with support from the US government through the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention.
According to Political Affairs Counselor Pierce Davis, cooperation between the US mission in Vietnam and Bach Mai Hospital has spanned nearly two decades, covering areas ranging from HIV care and treatment to strengthening testing capacity, infection prevention and control, antimicrobial resistance and influenza surveillance.
At the conference, Associate Professor Dao Xuan Co, director of Bach Mai Hospital, said testing is playing an increasingly important role in diagnosis, treatment selection and monitoring, prognosis and disease surveillance.
The Institute of Medical Testing was established a year ago through the restructuring and consolidation of testing units across the hospital, with the goal of building a unified, integrated system with standardized quality.
Bach Mai Hospital Director Dao Xuan Co thanked the US government, the US Embassy and its partners for their practical support, saying the hospital would manage and operate the equipment for its intended purposes in an effective and transparent manner. The hospital also hopes to continue developing cooperation programs in training, research and strengthening testing capabilities.
According to the director of Bach Mai Hospital, the Institute of Medical Testing will step up automation, digital transformation, data management and the development of advanced testing techniques, with the goal of advancing precision medicine and personalized treatment.
Speaking on the sidelines of the conference, Associate Professor Nguyen Tuan Tung, deputy director of Bach Mai Hospital, said the use of automated equipment and end-to-end digitization is helping shorten testing and result-reporting times.
Patient specimens are identified using QR codes and automatically transported to the laboratory. Once available, results are updated in the system and sent to doctors and patients, reducing manual processing steps.
While some tests previously took 2.5-3 hours, they can now be completed in less than one hour. For emergency tests, the turnaround time can be about 55 minutes, Dr. Nguyen Tuan Tung said.
Bach Mai Hospital is piloting the sharing of testing data with several hospitals in provinces, helping prevent patients from having to repeat tests that have already been performed.
According to hospital leaders, digitization and data sharing not only shorten waiting times but also reduce the time and travel costs for patients, as well as intermediate steps in the examination and treatment process.
Alongside digital transformation, Bach Mai Hospital is applying techniques such as next-generation sequencing (NGS), PCR and molecular biology in the diagnosis and treatment of cancer, hematological diseases and genetic disorders.
