There have been a number of incarnations of pathology services preceding the current service now performed by Monash Health. It all started for the sum of £120 in 1932 when a Pathology and Bacteriology Department was formed at the Melbourne Homeopathic Hospital. The Melbourne Homeopathic Hospital was later to become Prince Henry’s Hospital. In the 1940’s the Prince Henry’s Hospital introduced their first fully resourced pathologist and heralded the opening of Dandenong Hospital. In 1951 J.F. Funder was appointed Prince Henry’s first Director of Pathology services. The 1960s saw the formation of Prince Henry’s Medical Research Centre and the relocation of Dandenong hospital to its current location.
The 1970s were a time of growth and expansion for healthcare in Victoria with the opening of Moorabbin Hospital and the amalgamation of the Queen Victoria Hospital, Jessie McPherson Hospital and McCulloch house to form the Queen Victoria Medical Centre. Increasingly instrumentation progressed from predominantly manual processing to automation. Computers were introduced into routine laboratory use in the late 1970s at Dandenong Hospital and saw the dawning of the technological age for pathology services.
The following decade brought with it further innovation with the introduction of blood chemistry analysers and immunohistochemistry to pathology services at Dandenong Hospital. The mid 80s saw the opening of the new site for the Queen Victoria Medical Centre in Clayton. Monash Medical Centre was later formed following the amalgamation of Queen Victoria Medical Centre, Prince Henry’s Hospital and Moorabbin Hospital.
The Southern Health Care Network was formed in 1995 combining Monash Medical Centre and Dandenong Hospital including the integration of shared pathology services across all sites.
The new millennium brought with it the new Casey hospital at Berwick in 2004 and a significant expansion in genetic testing and automation and innovation of other pathology testing. In 2013 Southern Health changed its name to Monash Health and Southern Cross Pathology Australia changed its name to Monash Pathology. 2015/16 has been a time of significant change and development with both Clayton and Dandenong Hospital collection and pathology services undergoing extensive renovation and refurbishment introducing state of the art technology to ensure we continue to provide a valuable service to our community.