The Department of Health recently nominated Quinton Butterfield to be trained to assess laboratories in Bermuda. He attended a ten-day CAREC and EU training programme offered in Trinidad and Tobago. He said all Caribbean countries had a representative there. He gained certification as a Medical Laboratories Assessor and will use his skills to strengthen the standards of local labs ? including his own.

"This is getting Bermuda ready for the accreditation process," he said, "but I haven't looked at any labs yet. Next week I will look at my own and assess it under the terms of the ISO 15189-2003 standards (the standards learned in the ten-day course)."