We are delighted to highlight some of the international experts who will be speaking at Labquality Days 2022. The international portion of the programme includes fascinating speeches on quality in laboratory as well as developing health technology.
These speakers are true experts in their fields, so don’t miss out on this unique opportunity to hear all five of them speak at the same event!
Dr Westgard is the co-founder and president of Westgard QC, Inc., a small business providing tools, technology, and training for laboratory quality management. He is also an Emeritus Professor in the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the University of Wisconsin Medical School.
His interest in quality control began in 1976-77 when he was on sabbatical leave at Uppsala University in Sweden. This work led to the multi-rule control procedure, internationally known as “Westgard Rules.”
At Labquality Days, his lecture will open the international programme and will cover a historical overview of quality in laboratory medicine.
Sverre Sandberg is an MD, PhD and specialist in laboratory medicine. He is the director of NOKLUS, a Norwegian organisation for quality improvement of primary care laboratories that serves about 3000 users of POC equipment outside of hospitals.
He is the chair of SKUP, Scandinavian Evaluation of Laboratory Equipment for Primary Health Care. He is the director of the Norwegian Porphyria Centre (NAPOS). He is also a professor at the University of Bergen.
At Labquality Days, he will talk about improving external quality assessment through international cooperation.
Dr Mario Plebani is a professor of Clinical Biochemistry and Clinical Molecular Biology at the School of Medicine, University of Padova. He is also the Chief of Department of Laboratory Medicine at the University-Hospital of Padova.
He is also the Director of the postgraduate course of Clinical Pathology and Clinical Biochemistry at the University of Padova. Prof. Plebani is Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Chemistry and Laboratory Medicine, and Co-Editor in Chief of Diagnosis. He has published 1100 full papers, more than 900 abstracts and several books and book chapters
At Labquality Days, his speech will ask the question: Do We Really Measure the Quality of the Laboratory?
Dr Tony Badrick is the CEO of the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia Quality Assurance Programs (RCPAQAP). An expert in laboratory quality, Badrick has two PhDs, one of which is in Quality Management in Healthcare. He was the Associate Professor at the Faculty of Health Sciences and Medicine at Bond University for 4 years before becoming the CEO of the RCPAQAP in 2015.
A former consultant and adviser to the World Health Organisation, Badrick has published over 180 peer-reviewed articles and abstracts mainly on the themes of Quality Control, Quality Management and Clinical Biochemistry.
At Labquality Days, Dr Badrick will be discussing the future of quality management in his speech entitled Future Visions of EQA and Quality Control – Integrate IQC and EQA?
Koen Cobbaert works for Philips as a quality, regulatory and standards expert. He specializes in health software and views tech regulations through the computational lens. He enjoys giving training and lectures and thrives on solving complex regulatory challenges.
In the legislative domain, Koen chairs COCIR’s and DITTA’s software focus groups, representing its members at respectively the European Commission MDCG workgroups on Borderline and Classification, New Technologies, and Annex XVI devices and at the international level at the IMDRF workgroup on artificial intelligence. Currently, Koen is engaged in various proposed EU legislation relating to artificial intelligence and data.
At Labquality Days, Koen will give two talks. He will shed his light not only on the opportunities but also on the trust and regulatory challenges of MLMD and what can be done to overcome these. He will also give an overview of the proposed AI Act, highlighting its impact on the health sector focusing on its impact on laboratories as professional users of high-risk AI systems and biometric categorization systems, as potential in-house manufacturers of high-risk AI systems, but also as health data custodians.
