District Health Boards and medical laboratory workers have reached agreement on pay and conditions following a long running and sometimes rancorous 14-month dispute.
DHBs' spokeswoman Karen Roach said the agreement was good news for patients, laboratory workers and all staff.
The DHBs had been in dispute with the New Zealand Medical Laboratory Workers Union, which represents laboratory workers in 12 DHBs and the New Zealand Blood Service.
The DHBs' offer included a single collective employment contract with a 25 month term, adjustments to annual leave, long service leave, and on-call allowance rates and wage increases of 1 percent in December 2010, then a further 1.5 percent in March 2011.
Medical laboratory workers took rolling industrial action over a number of months last year after rejecting an offer they said would have given them no pay increase.
NZPA