Robert Michel
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.
Articles by Robert Michel
SC Pathologists Question Legality of TC/PC in State
CEO SUMMARY: Recently the South Carolina Society of Pathologists (SCSP) requested that the state’s Board of Medical Examiners review the legality, under state law, of certain technical component/professional component (TC/PC) arrangements between referring physicians and pathol…
New Criticisms in Ireland About Cervical Screening
CEO SUMMARY: Pathologists worldwide are witnessing how a government health service can erode its nation’s pathology capabilities in cytology. Ireland’s experiment in off-shoring all its Pap testing even as it requires women to register in a national database in order to get f…
Patient Privacy Laws Create Legal Risk for Labs
CEO SUMMARY: Before the nation’s healthcare system can achieve the integrated universal EHR, it must fix the crazy contradictions in state and federal laws governing patient privacy. There is discordance between federal law and state law that defines the role and responsibility…
Better Blood Utilization Reduces Costs by 29%
CEO SUMMARY: Use of an innovative two-pronged approach helped University of Alabama at Birmingham Hospital rein in runaway cost increases in blood products. Not only did it achieve annual savings of $3.5 million in three years—a 29% reduction—but it increased blood donations …
July 12, 2010 “Intelligence: Late Breaking Lab News”
Point-of-care testing (POCT) continues to gather momentum and grow at much faster rates than routine clinical laboratory testing. That’s the finding of analysts at Frost & Sullivan. In the United States, POCT product sales totaled $2.1 billion in 2009. Frost & Sullivan predicts that …
ISO 15189 Accreditation Earned by Spectra Labs
CEO SUMMARY: Spectra Laboratories Inc., recently announced that it had earned accreditation to the ISO 15189:2007 standard, following an assessment by a team from the Association for Laboratory Accreditation (A2LA). Spectra is a high-volume laboratory that serves renal patients. …
Genetic Testing Genie Is Now Out of the Bottle
CEO SUMMARY: There’s been an uneasy standoff between companies that want to sell genetic tests directly to consumers over the Internet and both state and federal regulators. But now it appears that the FDA is ready to take off the gloves and assert greater control over genetic …
Pathologists Not Enrolled In PECOS By July 6 Risk Denial of Medicare Claims
JULY 6, 2010, IS THE NEW DEADLINE for pathologists to enroll in the Provider Enrollment, Chain and Ownership System (PECOS) or risk being denied payment for Medicare claims. The federal Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) recently issued a statement that it will not p…
Using Performance-Based Part A Hospital Path Contracts
CEO Summary: One of pathology’s greatest challenges is adequate reimbursement for hospital Part A Pathology Services. Over the past two decades, ever more hospitals took steps to reduce or eliminate payment to pathologists for these services. Now several innovative pathology gr…
Halfpenny Technologies Buys Laboratory Management Services
TO BROADEN ITS CAPABILITIES in handling laboratory test data, Halfpenny Technologies, Inc., announced the acquisition of Laboratory Management Services (LMS) of Hauppauge, New York, earlier this month. Halfpenny seems to be particularly interested in the informatics…
CURRENT ISSUE
Volume XXXII, No. 10 – July 14, 2025
This issue is strong on different flavors of enforcement that clinical laboratories, whether they want to or not, will need to contend with. Lab stakeholders provide insights that medical labs need to brace for more action to counter pending test reimbursement rate cuts under PAMA. Also, this issue provides the legal and regulatory landscape for clinical labs’ use of AI and how it evolves with the technology. AI is creating legal uncertainty for clinical labs, especially around data privacy and FDA oversight of AI tools in diagnostics.
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