55th Annual Meeting
New York City, New York
The Blood Banks Association of New York State held its annual meeting in New York City on June 8th and 9th, 2006. It was co-sponsored by New York Blood Center and Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where the sessions were held. On June 7th, an AABB New Assessor Training course was held as a pre-meeting workshop.
When our annual meeting is held in NYC, the meeting is not held at a hotel because of the cost of meeting space. We therefore do not have space for exhibits where vendors may display their goods. Even so, we were very fortunate to have a number of donations to defray meeting expenses. We sincerely thank the following companies and organizations for their support: bioMérieux; Chartermed; Fresenius; Community Blood Services; Gambro BCT; Helmer; Hettich; ImmucorGamma; KOL Bio-Medical Instruments; Novo Nordisk; Olympus America, Inc.; Ortho-Clinical Diagnostics; Pall Medical; Roche Diagnostics; Terumo Medical Corp.; Validation Partners, Inc; and UnitedPharma. We would also like to thank New York Blood Center and Memorial Sloan-Kettering for being such gracious hosts.
The 2006 Annual Meeting Planning Committee consisted of Donna Strauss, MS (Chairperson); Raymond Comenzo, MD (CME/Course Director); Joseph Chiofolo, DO; Richard Davey, MD; Helene DePalma, MT(ASCP)SBB, CQA(ASQ); Carol Johnson, MT(ASCP)SBB; Debra Kessler, MS, RN; Beth Murwin, BB(ASCP); and Barbara Reilly, MT (ASCP)SBB. The meeting had three tracks on Thursday that ran concurrently: a Scientific/Clinical Session, a Management Session, and a Technical Session. On Friday, a Scientific/Technical Seminar was held.
On Thursday morning, the Scientific/Clinical Session held was "Management of the Chronically Transfused Patient." Millicent Sutton, MD, New York Blood Center, kicked off the session with a presentation entitled "Sickle Cell Disease: Clinical and Immunohematologic Management." Patricia Giardina, MD, New York Presbyterian Hospital, gave an update on "Advances in the Management of Oral Chelation: The Thalassemia Prototype" and Marion Reid, PhD, New York Blood Center, presented "Tools for Management of the Chronically Transfused Patient: Serology to Molecular Technology." The session provided an update on the clinical as well as immunohematologic challenges in the management of the chronically transfused patient.
The afternoon Scientific/Clinical Session was aptly entitled "Transfusion Medicine Updates by the Experts." Bruce McLeod, MD, Rush University Medical Center, spoke on "Rationales for Therapeutic Apheresis"; Glen Ramsey, MD, Children's Memorial Hospital, discussed "Transplants in 2006: Organs, Blood and You"; and Christopher Stowell, MD, PhD, Massachusetts General Hospital, gave an interesting talk on "Blood Substitutes: New Insights into Oxygen Delivery."
The morning Management Session was entitled "The Fine Line Between Risk and Safety." This session approached safety from various directions. It included the role of blood centers to their clients in time of emergency and their emergency/disaster management plans, the Hemovigilance System in Québec and increasing patient safety through introducing a culture of safety. Speakers were Donald Kender, PhD from New York Blood Center; Pierre Robillard, MD from Québec Public Health Institute; and Monica Santoro, RN, CPHRM, CPHQ from Winthrop University Hospital, respectively.
The afternoon Management Session was a very exciting session on regulatory issues entitled "Regulatory Update." Marianne Silva, MS, MT(ASCP)SBB,CQA(ASQ) from AABB spoke about various changes to the 24th edition of Standards. One of the changes is allowing 16 year-old blood donors. She also gave a very informative overview of ISBT 128 requirements. Sharyn Orton, MT(ASCP)SBB, MSPH, PhD from FDA presented "Your Hot Topics from the FDA". She discussed how the FDA reviews apheresis submissions, 7-day stored platelets, and 5-day pooled platelets, and the criteria for adverse event reporting. Jeanne Linden, MD, MPH gave a much needed talk on the new laboratory personnel licensure law, as well as some proposed changes to blood bank regulations.
Thursday morning's technical session consisted of a damp workshop involving antibody identification followed by an afternoon workshop consisting of an interactive game and case study reports used to present approaches to resolving Immunohematology problems. The morning speakers, all from New York Blood Center, were Denden Alcantara, BS, MT(ASCP); Daisy Charles Pierre, BS, BB (ASCP); Gregory Halverson, BS, MT(ASCP)SBB,DLM; Kim Hue-Roye, BA; and Christine Lomas Francis, MSc, FIBMS. The afternoon speakers were Mary Kowalski, MT (ASCP)SBB, Community Blood Center (Kansas City); Tanya Hamilton, MS, MT(ASCP)CQA(ASQ), NYU Medical Center; and Vivien Powell, MSc, FIBMS, Winthrop University Hospital.
Friday's seminar was entitled "Cellular Therapy: Challenges and Opportunities." The session provided an overview of the current state of cellular therapy clinical and research initiatives. Topics included disease implications for hematopoietic stem cell transplants, including the characteristics of cord blood grafts that affect patient outcomes for both children and adults. There was an overview of current and future roles of blood banks and tissue banks in cellular therapies, with a focus on potential catalytic synergies between the two types of banks in the field of regeneration medicine. Edward Snyder, MD, Yale-New Haven Hospital; Juliet Barker, MBBS (Hons), FRACP, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center; Rita Reik, MD, FCAP, ViaPath Enterprises, Inc.; and Cladd Stevens, MD, New York Blood Center, were the speakers.
More than 120 people attended Thursday's sessions and 70 people attended the seminar on Friday. The BBANYS annual business meeting was held Thursday afternoon and a lovely reception was held Thursday after the sessions ended, providing attendees with light refreshments and an opportunity to network with colleagues. Please be sure to mark your calendars for next year's meeting being held on June 6-8, 2007. The meeting is being held jointly with the New York State Department of Health at The Desmond Hotel and Conference Center in Albany, NY.
Mark your calendars! Next year's meeting will be held on June 6 - 8, 2007 at The Desmond Hotel and Conference Center in Albany, NY.