Quest Diagnostics 2007 Annual Report Download - page 5

Diversification
in diagnostic testing, information and
services. Our vision is that of dedicated
employees improving the health of patients
through unsurpassed diagnostic insights.
And we are guided by six core values:
Quality, Integrity, Innovation, Accountability,
Collaboration฀and฀Leadership.
We recognized long ago that in healthcare,
we must put patients first with special
service that sets us apart.
Patients, doctors and health plans appreciate
our quality, access and convenience. In
2007฀we฀expanded฀the฀use฀of฀our฀popular฀
appointment scheduling system for visits to
our patient service centers. Appointment
scheduling puts patients in charge of their
own schedules, and it helps us even out
the work flow in our patient service centers.
The evidence is clear that our strategy is
working. During the year, we renewed or
expanded relationships with most of the
major health plans, including Aetna,
CIGNA,฀Humana,฀multiple฀Blue฀Cross฀plans฀
and other local payers. And, despite
becoming a non-contracted provider with
UnitedHealthcare, a significant portion of
physicians and United members continue
to select us for our unique services.
Diversifying Our Business
We continue to diversify our revenue base.
Of฀our฀$7฀billion฀in฀annualized฀revenues,฀
about฀$2.5฀billion,฀or฀35%,฀is฀now฀coming฀
from anatomic pathology and advanced
gene-based and esoteric testing, versus
$1฀billion,฀or฀26%,฀of฀our฀revenues฀in฀2002.
Our acquisition of AmeriPath made us the
clear leader in cancer diagnostics. We have
strengthened our integrated offering of clin-
ical, anatomic pathology and esoteric test-
ing for hospitals, specialists and primary
care physicians.
We are excited about the opportunity to
accelerate our growth in anatomic pathology.
Many tissue specimens come from primary
care physicians. This is a significant growth
opportunity—and one that AmeriPath previ-
ously lacked the infrastructure to realize.
We have accelerated innovation, particularly
in esoteric and gene-based testing. Molec-
ular testing is now used for more than
diagnostics—to predict patient outcomes,
determine genetic predisposition and pre-
dict response to drug therapy. For example,
our฀ClariSure฀Comparative฀Genomic฀
Hybridization microarray was initially validated
to identify mental retardation in newborns.
Future tests may identify genetic abnormal-
ities associated with malignancies such
as leukemia.
We have introduced several blood tests to
provide information to physicians about
medical conditions without the need for
painful procedures in some cases. For exam-
ple, our HepaScore liver fibrosis test offers
physicians a non-invasive alternative to liver
biopsy by providing laboratory information
about liver fibrosis or cirrhosis in patients
with฀hepatitis฀C.฀Our฀expanding฀Leumeta฀
family of cancer tests provides an alterna-
tive to painful bone-marrow biopsies for
monitoring leukemia and lymphoma patients.
Point-of-care testing, which is expanding
rapidly, will help us diversify further and also
drive growth by offering doctors choice and
convenience. They can select traditional
laboratory testing or in-office testing
depend ing on the needs of each patient.
We are well positioned to benefit from the
shift toward point-of-care testing, thanks
to฀our฀HemoCue,฀Enterix฀and฀Focus฀
Diagnostics point-of-care products.
We continue to invest in information tech-
nology, which is an important differentiator
QU E S T DI A G N O S T I C S 2007 ANNUAL RE P O R T Page 3
We continue to diversify
our revenue base. Of our
$7฀billion฀in฀annualized฀
revenues,฀about฀$2.5฀billion,฀
or฀35%,฀now฀comes฀from฀
anatomic pathology and
gene-based and esoteric
testing,฀versus฀$1฀billion,฀or฀
26%,฀of฀our฀revenues฀in฀2002.
Point-of-care testing helps
diversify our revenues further
by offering doctors choice
and convenience.