Vancouver, British Columbia, August 20, 2026
Avricore Health Inc. has announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, HealthTab Ltd., has entered into a multi-year collaboration agreement with Abbott to expand point-of-care testing (PoCT) through community pharmacies across the United Kingdom. Under the agreement, HealthTab will supply and distribute Abbott’s Afinion™ 2 Analyzer through NHS-linked pharmacies, enabling testing for HbA1c and lipid profiles. The collaboration represents a significant development in pharmacy-based diagnostics and is designed to establish a scalable framework for expanding access to rapid testing while connecting testing, quality control, patient results, and pharmacist workflows through HealthTab’s digital platform.
Abbott Testing Supports Community Pharmacy Diagnostics
The collaboration will allow HealthTab to deploy Abbott’s Afinion™ 2 Analyzer within participating NHS-linked pharmacies in the UK. The point-of-care analyzer can support testing for HbA1c, an important biomarker used in diabetes management, as well as lipid profiles used to assess cardiovascular health. Bringing these diagnostic capabilities closer to patients through community pharmacies could help expand access to routine health testing and provide healthcare professionals with information that can support patient-care decisions. The agreement also establishes a structured framework for potential continued expansion of point-of-care testing across community pharmacy networks, reflecting the growing role of pharmacies as accessible healthcare destinations. Avricore said the collaboration represents a major milestone for its pharmacy-based testing model and brings together HealthTab’s digital infrastructure with Abbott’s diagnostic technologies and expertise.
HealthTab Connects Testing With Digital Workflows
At the center of the collaboration is the HealthTab™ platform, a cloud-based infrastructure designed to support pharmacy-based point-of-care testing at scale. The turnkey system combines diagnostic instruments, consumables, site onboarding, training, technical support, and digital connectivity within a unified framework. HealthTab’s platform connects point-of-care analyzers, patient results, quality-control data, and pharmacist workflows, enabling information generated at participating sites to be captured and managed through a centralized digital environment. This approach is designed to simplify implementation across multiple pharmacy locations while supporting consistent data collection and real-time analytics. By connecting testing technology with digital workflows, HealthTab aims to help pharmacy partners manage testing programs more efficiently and provide a consistent experience across participating locations. The model could also support public-health reporting and performance monitoring as community-based diagnostic services expand.
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Quality Management Supports Testing Accuracy
Quality and analytical reliability are central components of the HealthTab model. The company operates a quality-management program in collaboration with CEQAL Inc., a reference-method laboratory and member of the CDC Cholesterol Reference Method Laboratory Network. According to Avricore, the program is designed to apply laboratory-level quality principles to point-of-care testing conducted in community pharmacies. The framework includes centralized reagent lot monitoring, mandatory internal quality control, and external quality-assessment (EQA) events. These measures are intended to support accurate, traceable, and consistent test results across participating pharmacy sites. The emphasis on quality management is particularly important as point-of-care testing becomes increasingly integrated into decentralized healthcare delivery, where maintaining consistent analytical performance across numerous locations can be challenging. The HealthTab and Abbott collaboration therefore combines diagnostic technology, cloud-based data management, pharmacist workflows, and quality assurance to support a broader community-based testing infrastructure in the UK. The initiative highlights the continued expansion of MedTech and digital diagnostics beyond traditional clinical laboratories and into accessible pharmacy settings, potentially improving the availability of actionable health information while supporting more connected models of patient care.
Source: HealthTab, Abbott press relese
