Media Release

Udupi, May 17: Kasturba Medical College & Hospital, Manipal has taken another leap in a move to upgrade and strengthen the Mycobacteriology laboratory services in department of Microbiology. The inauguration of Biosafety Laboratory Level 3 was done by the Dr H S Ballal pro-chancellor MAHE, in the presence of Dr H Vinod Bhat, vice-chancellor, Dr Poornima Baliga, pro vice-chancellor (Health Sciences), Dr Pragna Rao, dean, Kasturba Medical College Manipal, Dr Avinash Shetty, medical superintendent, Muthana C G, COO Kasturba Hospital Manipal and other faculty members.

Kasturba Medical College Manipal has become the first private medical college in Karnataka to have such facility. This ceremony was witnessed by Dr Chidananda Sanju, district tuberculosis officer, Udupi and the experts in the area of tuberculosis from University of Sydney, Australia.

Dr Kiran Chawla, professor and head of Microbiology Kasturba Medical College Manipal stressed for the need of BSL 3 lab as per the norms of Revised National Tuberculosis programme, to provide safe and infection free environment for the laboratory staff members dealing with mycobacterial culture.

The BSL 3 state-of-art high containment laboratory will be facilitating the routine diagnostics work and detection of drug-resistant TB under negative-pressure conditions and will be providing a wide range of tests including microscopy, mycobacterial liquid culture, GeneXpert testing, and Drug Susceptibility Testing (DST) not only for patients from Udupi district but also from adjoining areas.