Celeste Smither, M.T. (ASCP)9 S. Eau Claire AvenueMadison, Wisconsin 53705

January 5, 2016 RE: Letter of professional reference for Doug Johnson

To Whom it may concern:

I am a recently retired Medical Technologist with experience in the Hematology Lab for 35 years at Meriter Labs in Madison, Wisconsin. I specialized in the coagulation testing area, with the responsibility of instrument selection, reagent and assay decisions. My Lab has utilized Diagnostica Stago instrumentation over the course of sixteen years. My relationship with Doug Johnson started with our first purchase in 2000, some sixteen years ago. Our latest Stago instrument acquisition was in 2011.

All the years that we have been Stago customers, I have had the pleasure of working with Doug. He is a motivated and knowledgeable individual. He kept us abreast of the new things coming to the coagulation lab. He stopped by consistently to keep in touch, even if he knew a new instrument was not in our current budget. He always delivered on his promises and took care of our needs.

I would like to showcase one aspect of Doug’s positive influence on the inter-laboratory relationships of our region. We were the first lab in our area to acquire the Stago instruments. This created a feeling that we didn’t have much continuity with the other clinical labs. Doug helped foster a cooperative attitude and other labs turned over to Stago, one after another, until the Stago instruments became the most popular in our region. We could now call each other and request to borrow some buffer, or help collect samples for a research study, or compare notes on correlations, get the lowdown on a new assay, etc. This type of lab to lab cooperation is not always typical in our industry. Doug helped to make us feel like one big, happy Stago family in Wisconsin.

These cooperative relationships that developed with other technologists in Madison advanced my own professional knowledge. I owe Doug Johnson gratitude for that. What a bonus to purchase an instrument and eventually feel part of a clinical coagulation family caring for patients as best as possible. Doug was not merely a salesperson, but he understood the importance of excellent patient care as our primary goal with laboratory testing.

Sincerely,

Celeste Smither, M.T. (ASCP)