Until Robert L. Michel came along and founded The Dark Intelligence Group (DIG) two decades ago, the clinical laboratory industry and the anatomic pathology profession lacked a trustworthy source for information about the management and operations of medical laboratories. From its inception in 1995, The Dark Report quickly became the “go to” source of industry intelligence, innovations in lab management, and strategic market analysis.
This excellence in reporting has earned recognition from his peers. For example, twice Michel and The Dark Report have won national awards for best investigative reporting by the Specialty Information Publishers Association. In 2005, the award was for Michel’s coverage about how the anatomic pathology condominium laboratories (pod labs) operated by urologists and gastroenterologists came to be, who operated them, and how these owners marketed the AP condo labs to other physician groups. In 2009, Michel’s award for best investigative reporting resulted from his published interviews with Quest Diagnostics Incorporated when the company admitted that, for a period of 18 months, it had been reported inaccurate Vitamin 25(OH) D results because of problems with its laboratory-developed test methodology. The Dark Report’s story was picked up by The New York Times and was in the national news cycle for several days.
In his role as Editor-in-Chief, Michel brought unique capabilities to DIG and The Dark Report. His management training and diverse business experience—along with his skills as a concise writer and analyst—proved to be a winning combination for readers of The Dark Report. For that reason, Michel’s story has many intriguing elements.
Immediately prior to founding DIG, he had served in several executive positions for Nichols Institute based in Portland, Oregon, and San Juan Capistrano, California. This was during the time that Nichols Institute was an independent public lab company with annual revenues of about $280 million (prior to its acquisition by MetPath, Inc., now Quest Diagnostics Incorporated). He traveled extensively to many of the clinical lab business units owned by Nichols Institute in different regions of the United States and played a role in formulating effective market strategies in response to the emergence of closed-panel HMOs, capitated pricing, and full-risk managed care contracts, among other successful management initiatives.
Prior to his service at Nichols Institute, Michel served at three different Fortune 100 companies. These were Procter & Gamble, Centex Corporation, and Financial Corp. of America. Each was an opportunity to master new management techniques and apply them in different industries. Between these positions, he gained experience as an entrepreneur, having founded a real estate development firm and a general contracting company in the Southeastern United States.
Robert Michel earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he played rugby, a sport he participated in for another 22 years. He is a native of California and grew up in Santa Ana.
From the Volume XXVI No. 3 – February 25, 2019 issue
Quest Diagnostics sold its clinical laboratory business in India last December, thus ending a 12-year effort to build a thriving business in that nation of 1.3 billion people. The buyer was Strand Life Sciences of Bengaluru, India. The transaction was announced in a press release issued by Quest Diagnostics and no purchase price was disclosed.
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From the Volume XXVI No. 3 – February 25, 2019 issue
IN AN UPDATE TO A CASE REPORTED LAST YEAR, the investigation at the Arkansas Veterans Heath Care System of the Ozarks and the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Fayetteville, Ark., now shows that as many as 12 veterans died as a result of this one pathologist’s errors, according to a report by Arkansas KFSM 5
From the Volume XXVI No. 2 – February 4, 2019 issue
More than 63 healthcare and medical service organizations signed a letter asking officials at the federal Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to reconsider their latest interpretation of a National Coverage Determination (NCD) on the subject of next-generation sequencing (NGS). Clinicalomics wrote that “the final NCD also included repeat testing when a new primary cancer
From the Volume XXVI No. 1 – January 14, 2019 issue
Up to 10,000 patients will get free genetic testing at Northwell Health, the nation’s largest urban health network. In a deal announced on Jan. 9, Northwell Health and Color, a genetic testing company, will collaborate on a program to offer genetic tests to Northwell patients as part of routine primary care. This expands an earlier pilot
From the Volume XXVI No. 1 – January 14, 2019 issue
CEO SUMMARY: This will be one of the most challenging years facing the clinical lab industry since the early 1990s, when closed panel HMOs were the disruptive force that generated deep cuts in lab test prices. However, unlike HMOs of that era, the CMS scheme to collect private payer lab test prices and use that
From the Volume XXV No. 18 – December 24, 2018 issue
Pathologists at the Houston Methodist health system created a website that tracks confirmed flu cases in real time. It is located at: https://flu.houstonmethodist.org and uses epidemiology data from the eight hospitals in the health system. The system updates every morning by polling the previous day’s data in the laboratory information system. Wesley Long, MD, an Assistant
From the Volume XXV No. 18 – December 24, 2018 issue
CEO SUMMARY: This year’s list of the Top 10 Lab Industry Stories for 2018 is dominated by new directives from Medicare and private health insurers, as well as significant decisions by federal courts. Collectively, these developments create new compliance risks for all clinical laboratories and anatomic pathology groups. What is more notable about these top
From the Volume XXV No. 17 – December 3, 2018 issue
Another long-established regional laboratory company is about to be acquired. On November 27, Boyce and Bynum Pathology Laboratories of Columbia, Mo., disclosed that it had entered an agreement to be acquired by Quest Diagnostics Inc. Notably, the press release about the agreement states that the anatomic pathology division, Boyce and Bynum Professional Services, Inc., and the
From the Volume XXV No. 17 – December 3, 2018 issue
IN RECENT DAYS, RUMORS HAVE SURFACED that UnitedHealthcare has begun to terminate the contracts it holds with a number of regional and non-national clinical laboratories.
This news surfaced just as The Dark Report went to press. Given its importance to the clinical laboratory industry, we wanted to alert lab executives and pathologists to this development as
From the Volume XXV No. 16 – November 13, 2018 issue
In recent weeks, Apple signed agreements with the nation’s two largest lab companies to make their lab test data available on Apple’s Health Record app. Laboratory Corporation of America was first to announce its agreement with Apple on Oct. 29. Quest Diagnostics issued its press release about its pact with Apple on Nov. 8. Apple says that
