A LU M N I I N ACT ION
TRUE POSITIVE
Chief Laboratory Officer for the
I’m not really performing tests anymore, but I’m physically in the
North Dakota Department of Health
lab still. I oversee the daily operations and look to help improve
and graduate of UND’s Medical
the technology and bring on new instrumentation and make
Laboratory Science (MLS) program
sure we stay up-to-date. With this SARS-CoV-2 [COVID-19]
Christie Massen, Ph.D., M.S., MLS
pandemic, we’re bringing on a lot of new instrumentation,
(ASCP), spoke with North Dakota
diversifying platforms, and exploring the performance between
Medicine in July 2020 about
the different tests, or looking at molecular or serology methods
COVID testing, false positives, true
and helping our team know how to interpret test results. We
positives, and how her profession
used to do roughly 200 tests per day, culturing everything
shines in trying times.
from tuberculosis and rabies to chlamydia, gonorrhea, and
Interview conducted and edited by Brian James Schill Thanks for your time, Christie. So—I suppose your life is all COVID all the time. Yes, the past few months have been a whirlwind: discussing with others what test results mean and what lab tests are better, and what we should do in our lab for detection and monitoring for COVID in North Dakota. We also do some testing for people from South Dakota or Minnesota or Montana who have a need. Does being the chief laboratory officer for the state mean you’re in the lab less these days? 18
North Dakota Medicine Fall 2020
food-borne pathogens. Now, with COVID, we process up to 5,000 tests per day just for coronavirus. We’ve increased our capacity considerably. Pre-COVID, we had 19 of us, but now we have more than 130 employees! On that note, I get the sense that the role lab science plays has been underappreciated throughout this pandemic, relative to other health providers. Can you describe for me what MLS has brought to the table in terms of containment over the past few months? It’s incredibly important that people with our background are performing these tests. We’re trained to understand how the tests work. We’re highly trained to interpret them and
