VALDOSTA — No one could foresee the impact of the little testing lab that was begun by Dr. Byron Davis in a small office space at the Doctors Building on Pendleton Drive in 1958.

Davis, a Valdosta pathologist who worked at South Georgia Medical Center beginning in 1957, had earned his credentials, in part, by studying at Cornell University under the famous Dr. George Papanicolaou, inventor of the pap smear for cancer detection in women, a diagnostic test that has saved millions of lives.

Davis started the medical testing lab and literally handled the testing and delivery of samples on his own.

Fifty years later, Davis’ work has evolved into one of the most productive and state-of-the-art medical testing labs in the nation. Davis left SGMC to manage Doctors Laboratory full-time in 1964.

The Doctors Laboratory Inc. now operates out of a 37,000 square foot building at 2906 Julia Drive off Connell Road on land that formerly was a corn field. It employs 200 staff on site and another 200 at satellite labs located at 24 locations in Alabama, Georgia and Florida.

Some 37 percent of the company stock is owned by its employees and the rest by private stock owners. While Davis now enjoys retired life on the Georgia coast and is the firm’s largest stockholder, his “little lab that could” continues to keep pace with state-of-the-art technology that, for example, enables it to be the only lab in Georgia that has a federal Substance Abuse Mental Health Services Administration certification.

The company has grown its market through the Southeast and is in national demand, delivering test results on drug testing samples for employer clients as far away as Nevada and Wisconsin.

In 2007, the lab’s headquarters on Julia Drive, where testing is done overnight and delivered the next day to clients by courier truck and overnight services, delivered some 6 million samples.

With the advent of computer technology and the Internet, Doctors Laboratory is able to compete with larger corporate testing labs. Its future is bright in a city that continues to grow into a metropolitan community.

“I never thought it would grow to this size,” said Lamar Courson, who became CEO of the company in 2003 after serving as its operations director since 1971. “I don’t think anyone ever thought we would grow to be this big.”

Dick Rockey, known locally as former announcer for Lowndes High School football and current Valdosta State University football, is the lab’s director of sales and marketing. He worked in the lab’s sales department for 13 years and was on the road for 12 of those years. In 2006, Rockey was promoted to his current position.

“I think what surprises me the most in my years here is seeing how we’re now able to compete against the larger national labs,” Rockey said. “We are able to go head-to-head with them.”

Not many regional labs like Doctor’s Laboratory are left because the larger labs keep buying them, Courson explained. But the Valdosta company has placed itself in a position to avoid such a takeover.

And in many medical communities in the Southeast, the company has put Valdosta on their map. The satellite labs are located as far west as Mobile, Ala., south to Miami, Fla., and east to the Atlantic seaboard in Georgia and Florida.

Several local companies in Valdosta use the lab as their preferred lab for implementing drug-free work site policies by sending employees in for pre-hire drug screenings and on-the-job testing.

Events are being planned to celebrate the lab’s 50th anniversary but details have not been nailed down because the administrators want to try to make sure Davis can participate.

Meanwhile, the company’s success story continues to grow. Insurance companies have changed the game, somewhat, by determining which lab a patient can utilize for tests, but the lab’s high ratings and hi-tech capabilities have helped to prevent any negative impact on business from that trend, Courson said.

“It used to be you would go to the doctor and he or she would give you a requisition for a lab test, and it would be your responsibility to go find a lab to get it done,” he said. “Now insurance sometimes dictates which labs they’ll use. It’s not always the case but it’s getting to be more prevalent. But we don’t seem to be losing any business as a result. We’re doing very well.”



Q: What sorts of capabilities does Doctors Laboratory provide?



A: Our broad testing capabilities include chemistry, immunology, parasitology, cytology, microbiology, pathology, toxicology, hematology, microscopy, serology and virology.



Q: What are some of the latest technological advances, equipment wise, the lab now uses to continue its competitive reputation as state-of-the-art?



A: (From Phil Shah, department head of Microbiology at the company) We have the D.D. Viper, an automated pippetter. With its robotic arm, enclosed in glass, and using space-age technology, the Viper tests for sexually transmitted disease, saves thousands of man hours by testing multiple samples in just minutes and removes the chance of human error with its incredible accuracy.

There is also the Vitek analyzer, which can diagnose types of growths caused by common infectious diseases and also tells which anti-biotic will treat the growth. It was developed by NASA. These go for about $250,000 apiece.

There’s also our Roche Modular, which cost more than the construction of our administrative wing. It performs 13 different comprehensive metabolic tests of blood, urine and body fluids and can perform 4,000 tests in one hour and can release results in 15 minutes on liver function, kidney function and electrolytes. These are just a few examples of the equipment we have on site.



Q: What are your plans for the future?



A: (Courson:) We plan to continue to grow our business and expanding our services regionally and nationally, and we also have a goal to get 50 percent of our clients to use our Web site to file paperwork for tests. Our software was developed in-house by Programmer Dan Henry and IT Department Head Bernie Napier, and it is very state-of-the-art. Our clients in satellite locations can get online today and view samples results in “live” real time in direct communication with our staff here. It’s an amazing capability.



Q: How does your staff keep pace with the growing workload?



A: Most of the testing is done in the night and early morning hours. We have shipments ready for our couriers to deliver in the morning. We do contract with some drivers but most are employed directly by the lab here.



Doctors Laboratory Inc.

Address: 2906 Julia Drive

Phone: 229-671-2285

Owners: stockholders

Web site: www.doctorslabinc.com