Petralia Fam

I am an extremely dedicated and driven mother of two young daughters. I have always had a passion for science and research, and initially worked towards becoming a veterinarian. Life blessed me with my beautiful girls before I could follow through with that dream, but my passions have remained steadfast.

I have recently completed my Associates Degree in Biology after many years of working and being a mother. While employed at Banfield, The Pet Hospital I was given the opportunity to perform multitudes of different tasks and fell into obtaining, processing, prepping, and running a variety of different laboratory tests. I found a great fit at Antech Diagnostics as a parasitology technician.

After moving on from Antech I found myself in a leadership role at Labcorp where my skills were shown through my dedication to research and my can do personality. In addition to my laboratory experience, I am an extremely fast learner and can perform a variety of functions efficiently and accurately. I love learning new things and perfecting my work.

I pride myself on being flexible and willing to work a variety of different shifts. I also possess customer service skills and am a great listener who can empathize with many different types of people. I honestly am happy anywhere in a laboratory or doing anything that contributes to the health and wellbeing of humans and animals alike.

Technical Training Coordinator II- Specimen Accessioning - Labcorp - Itasca, IL

(2025-03 - 2025-12)

• Responsible for the hiring and onboarding of potential employees
• Provided on-going group and individualized training for the purpose of supporting employees to further fulfill workplace enhancement
• Delivered training in areas such as company and department policies and procedures while fine tuning existing practices
• Required to work Mondays-Saturdays from 6pm- whenever I was no longer needed which was usually around 4am
• Had absolutely no issues or complaints working the extra hours and management knew they could count on me to make sure everything was completed accurately and efficiently
• Being a Lead Trainer was responsible for working all holidays without complaint
• Came to work every day with a friendly and helpful attitude
• Favorite part of training new employees was when they would have questions because felt like if I didn't know the answer it would just make me that much better of a trainer
• Developed and implemented numerous training documents and brochures designed for ease of use by all
• Trained in a variety of different laboratory specialties such as Clinicals, Cytology, Hospital, and Histology
• Supported leadership with their goals by recognizing and developing action plans for underperforming employees
• Responsible for the maintenance of accurate records and logs in regards to all trainings that were completed
• In times of high volume, quickly and efficiently worked the laboratory floor filling in wherever it was needed
• Consistently hit beyond the typical productivity, even as a trainer who was constantly being asked questions
• Always put the new hires first, making them feel welcome in their new place of employment and let them know they had someone to approach if they had any issues at all
• Responsible for attending weekly training sessions where new ideas are brought forth and set into motion
• Spent time traveling to various clinics, hospitals, and laboratories to support the business practices
• Provided with a multitude of knowledge and resources in regards to all varieties of lab tests and how they are performed
• Spent time daily with laboratory technicians and technologists to gather input about how we can better support them
• Extremely comfortable around bodily fluids such as blood, urine, feces, and irreplaceable specimen such as biopsies, POC, calculi, synovial fluid, tissue samples embedded in paraffin blocks, and postmortem specimens
• Was constantly in charge of separating specimen and making sure they were delivered efficiently to the correct Specimen Processors
• Between training new hires, separating out samples, running back and forth between histology, cytology, and Day Lab, frozen samples, refrigerated samples, irreplaceables, and answering numerous questions, my days flew by and I did enjoy it

Parasitology Technician and Specimen Processor - Antech Diagnostics - Oak Brook, IL

(2023-01 - 2024-11)

Within the first 6 months of my employment I was awarded with the company's prestigious "Pawsitive Performer Award" which I was nominated for not only by my peers but by my superiors who made the ultimate decision in awarding the "Employee of the Quarter" recognition to me. This was due to my tireless work ethic, my ability to bring up the spirits of my fellow coworkers to a point where so many of them had mentioned that ever since I started working they actually enjoyed coming to work again. It was a great honor to receive this recognition especially for only being there a short amount of time.

I felt like I was appreciated and my hard work made a difference!

• Set up, ran, read and released lab tests
• Performed routine testing which may include fecal egg count, Giardia ELISA, PeggS, and PeggM
• Up to date on all quality control standards
• Meeting 100% production every pay period by reading an average of 14-18 24 sample loads per shift
• Consistently made 110% production bonus due to speed and proficiency
• Can identify toxacara and toxacaris ascaris suum, ascaris, hookworm of multiple varieties, whipworm, coccidia (both eimeria and isospora), cryptosporidium, toxoplasmosis, Giardia cysts and trophozoites, strongyle, monezia, strongyloides, hymenolepis, taenia, dipylidium, diphyllobothrium, alaria, paragonimus, nemontodirus, rhaditiform larvae, Aelurostrongylus, capillaria type A, B, and P, filaroides, synganmus trachea, tritrichomonas, sarcosystis, bayliscaris, spirometra, physalopteras, demodex,
• Can dissect an actual worm and place it on a slide in order to determine which parasite eggs are located, therefore identifying the worm without an ova and parasite slide
• One of very few technicians assigned to read "Manifest" loads, which consist of samples of extra extreme importance as well as exotic animal samples which often have unique and rare parasites that I can identify and am familiar with, including microscopically small entamoeba
• Set up, read, and know what to identify on direct smear tests
• When running Giardia ELISA it is run accurately yet quickly due to the amount of samples needed to be tested versus the time each Sample/Substrate/Conjugate/Stop Test takes to process
• Understood and followed all applicable Standard Operating Procedures (SOP's)
• Maintains clean and organized work area. Restocks supplies as needed
• General laboratory duties
• Extensive microscope work
• Separating and accessioning samples into computer
• Operating centrifuges to spin samples
• Builds loads into the computer and can split loads into individual samples to be spun accurately
• By using a positive meniscus to capture cover slips, it avoids unnecessary spillage therefore compromising accuracy

Associates Degree - Biology