Siemens at the Clinical Diagnostics & Research Online Conference 2015

What is the future of personalized medicine? Featuring Dr. Trevor Hawkins (An Introduction to Companion Diagnostics), Dr. Patrick Joseph (Making It Personal for Patients), and Dr. Richard Frank (The Impact on Healthcare Policy), this lively panel discussion will highlight the many ways in which Companion Diagnostics are changing the face of healthcare.

As a patient-centric shift continues to sweep our healthcare system, pharmaceutical companies are increasingly seeing the value of targeting treatments to specific patient populations, making their therapies more personal. In the burgeoning age of personalized medicine, companies are looking for ways to develop more specific, efficacious, and cost-effective treatments that are tailored to a patient’s needs, rather than focusing solely on the blockbuster drugs that have dominated the industry over the past few decades. Some companies have found novel ways to accommodate this shift, including adjusting their business models to focus on healthcare outcomes and collaborating with payers and providers to simplify reimbursement and provide tools and technologies to increase medication adherence.

Join Drs. Hawkins, Joseph, and Frank and learn how companion diagnostics promises to change the way patients are treated, therapies may be prescribed, and tests are developed, and how this fast-moving evolution will impact all of healthcare.

Learning Objectives:
 

• At the end of the presentation, attendees will be able to:
• Understand how companion diagnostics may improve outcomes by personalizing medicine.
• Appreciate the pathways for adoption and prescription of companion diagnostic tests.

Variability of vitamin D results remains a hot topic today as more options are available to laboratories. This webinar examines how clinical and analytical factors such as vitamin D binding protein (DBP), 3-epi-25(OH)vitamin D3, and vitamin D2 supplementation may impact vitamin D values, and how these in turn may impact clinical decisions. It also discusses how initiatives such as the NIH Office of Dietary Supplements Vitamin D Standardization Program (VDSP) will improve standardization of results.

Learning Objectives:
 

• Understand the clinical and analytical factors that influence the measurement of vitamin D by immunoassay and how they impact patient results.
• Learn about the implementation of the Vitamin D Standardization Program and the next steps in vitamin D harmonization.

Every laboratory wants to achieve the highest quality possible and meet its commitment to deliver timely results.  However, managing Quality Control (QC) is frequently a manual and time-consuming process which may raise turnaround time and the risk of errors. In this session, Eric Vasbinder from University of Michigan Hospital will demonstrate proven techniques such as patient moving averages and Westgard rules to proactively manage QC issues. Over the past 7 years, the University of Michigan has been able to reduce errors by 73% and increase volume 97%, while holding headcount flat. Learn the tips and techniques that have worked for this progressive laboratory to optimize QC with the CentraLink™ Data Management System.

Learning Objectives:
 

• Learn how to proactively manage QC and prevent problems before they occur.
• Evaluate the right batch size for patient moving averages.
• Explore the benefits of integrating QC with your data management process.
• Pinpoint the problem areas and redirect samples to minimize delay and reagent waste.

The value of measuring lactate levels is expanding. Though generally considered a nonspecific biomarker, knowing lactate levels early in a patient’s presentation can provide valuable information to help guide assessment and treatment. It can be particularly useful in ICU and ED settings where the presentation of symptoms may be inconclusive while diseases progress rapidly with severe pathology. Lactate testing can open a critical window for early intervention when treatment is most likely to be successful. This seminar provides a framework for understanding lactate and the role it can play as a prognostic indicator of morbidity and mortality.

Seminar Objectives
At the conclusion of the seminar, attendees should be able to:
 

• Understand the role of lactate as a prognostic indicator for morbidity and mortality
• Identify disease states where lactate testing can add significant clinical value
• Understand the differences between the systemic inflammatory response (SIR) and sepsis, severe sepsis and septic shock
• Understand the urgency associated with assessing lactate levels

For more information, visit the official page for BioConference Live 2014.