National Medical Laboratory Professionals Week was celebrated the fourth week in April. Leaders, staff members, pathologists and laboratory staff members commemorated this time with many notable events.
Every year, the Department of Pathology honors and remembers Virginia Deeken, a respected educator for the Texas Children’s Hospital Laboratory from 1972 to 1993, with the Virginia Deeken Memorial Lecture. This year, Dr. Adekunle Adesina, medical director, Texas Children’s Molecular and Neuropathology Laboratories and Global Pathology, presented “Global Pathology Outreach – All the Sides of the Coin.”
The department recognized both a team and individual who made extraordinary contributions to patient care through their laboratory service.
The presentation of the GJ Buffone Pathology Improvement Award was made to Betty Sapinsky, Maureen Quinn, Christina Moreno, Tyler Giess, Mindy Dement and Shari Lim who worked together to create the protocol for management of massive transfusion cases with the Pavilion for Women patients. They collaborated with physicians and caregivers to create a standardized and streamlined process to support the fastest service. The system has reduced nursing staff’s efforts in providing the required information and samples needed for laboratory testing. This revised protocol reduced turnaround times for results and seamlessly tracked transfused blood products.
For the Individual Excellence award, we honor a pair of individual leaders involved in information mining and presentations/graphics services, respectively. Michael Dowlin, Pathology’s senior programmer analyst, quietly creates and advances the data mining and analytical tools we demand for quality assurance, dashboard metrics and information archiving and retrieval. Karen Prince, Pathology’s graphics and image specialist, has incredible talents in design and presentation that illustrate the department’s staff, faculty, accomplishments and communications both professionally and artistically.
Medical laboratory testing plays a crucial role in the detection, diagnosis and treatment of disease in patients. An estimated 60 percent to 70 percent of all decisions regarding a patient’s diagnosis and treatment, hospital admission and discharge are based on laboratory test results.
Drs. Greg Buffone (left), Rocky Hui, and Jun Teruya (right), present the GJ Buffone Pathology Improvement Award to the Pavilion for Women Massive Transfusion Protocol team: Betty Sapinsky, Mindy Dement, Maureen Quinn, Shari Lim, Christina Moreno (not pictured) and Tyler Giess (not pictured).
Individual Excellence Award recipients are Michael Dowlin (left) and Karen Prince.