By Heloísa Lemos/ASCOM/LAIS/UFRN

The Central Public Health Laboratory of Rio Grande do Norte Dr. Almino Fernandes (LACEN/RN) received the donation of equipment delivered through the project “Syphilis No”, through the Laboratory of Technological Innovation in Health (LAIS). The delivery took place on Friday (20), at LACEN’s headquarters.

Altogether, three machines: two hospital biological safety cabins and a vertical freezer -30ºc for blood banks, received by the laboratory’s Administrative Director, Derley Galvão. “This donation is extremely important because it will allow us to replace old equipment and to advance in actions that we have already performed here at LACEN. For example, one of the biological safety cabins can be used in the immunology sector that didn’t have this equipment, which will allow the work processes to be improved and simplified”, explains Derley Galvão.

LAIS executive director, Ricardo Valentim, talked about the importance of the donation for the “Syphilis No” project: “The Syphilis No project has as one of its objectives to structure the Sentinel Network, which has played an important role in the diagnosis of syphilis and other STIs. So, it is a very important project to support diagnosis in primary care, in the specialized network, and in high complexity. For this to happen, the goal is to support the structuring of LACEN through the donation of this equipment, improving the testing capacity and qualifying the management of patients diagnosed with the disease, whether they are men, women, pregnant women, or babies.

Besides LACEN, in Rio Grande do Norte, other actions of equipment delivery are also being carried out in several cities in the country, being this one of the goals of the “Syphilis No” project.