A visit to NIU Health Services usually results in something left behind, be it blood, tissue or urine.

But what becomes of that specimen afterward?

An $18 billion-a-year industry has started as a result of the soaring demand for human tissue and organs, as state- and federally-run biotech companies do what some call unconsented genetic testing. But NIU’s top health official says local wastes are tightly controlled on campus.

“We can do a variety of tests, but we only perform the kinds of tests that are ordered,” said Dr. Linda Herrman, NIU Health Services director. “And when we are done, we dispose of the samples according to approved procedures.

“We don’t sell the stuff to companies, or anything that I’m aware of,” she said. “But our staff can’t do everything here. Some of our samples are sent to Kishwaukee Hospital or Quest Diagnostics.”

U.S. doctors and laboratory researchers allegedly have repeatedly violated patient’s Fourth Amendment rights against unreasonable search and seizure by performing tests on samples. In rare instances when patients have found out about the tests and attempted to sue, the courts have ruled in favor of biotech companies.

The companies’ defense is that once a sample is removed from a patient, the property rights fall into the hands of the researchers, to be put to use for society’s betterment.

Kishwaukee Community Hospital limits its testing to what’s necessary, one employee said.

“NIU sends us blood samples, and we do specifically whatever tests are ordered,” said Steve Bush, the hospital’s laboratory manager. “I have no recollection of us ever doing any testing that was not ordered.”

Bush said certain ordered tests require equipment that his laboratory doesn’t have the facilities for, and samples sometimes are sent to an outside lab.

“The samples are kept according to regulatory requirements,” Bush said. “Depending on the area of the laboratory, some stuff needs to be kept for as long as 30 days.”

Quest Diagnostics, the other outside laboratory where NIU sends students’ samples, is the nation’s leading provider of gene-based medical testing, performing more than 6.5 million tests per year.

“We are proud of our role as an innovator in gene-based testing,” CEO Kenneth W. Freeman said, “both through our research and development center, the world-renowned Nichols Institute, as well as alliances with leading academic and commercial technology developers.”

In January, Quest Diagnostics agreed to pay $13.1 million to settle government allegations of healthcare fraud related to billing practices at the Nichols Institute. The investigation found that certain laboratories operated by the Nichols Institute defrauded Medicare, Medicaid and other various government health care programs by routinely billing patients for laboratory tests that weren’t medically necessary.

“This settlement again demonstrates the United States’ commitment to protecting federal funds from fraud and abuse,” said David W. Ogden, assistant attorney general of the Department of Justice’s Civil Division.