This year’s programme is shaped around the theme: Patient Centered Laboratory Services

The organisers reserve the right to make changes to the programme

Day 1 - Wednesday 25 September

Te Aro and Waterfront Room, Harbour City Function Centre, 4 Taranaki Street

8.00 am - Registration opens

8.30 am - Welcome and karakia

SETTING THE SCENE

9.00 am - Setting the scene

Dr Hamish Campbell

Deputy Chair, Health Select Committee, and Member of Parliament, New Zealand National Party

9.45 am - Cybersecurity on the Frontlines: Real Stories of Incident Response in Health

Sonny Taite, Ngāi Te Rangi

National Chief Information Security Officer, Te Whatu Ora

In this session, Sonny will share real-life experiences from his team's responses to cybersecurity incidents in the health sector. He will discuss the challenges of managing threats in a critical infrastructure environment and offer insights into effective strategies and tools for improving emergency response and overall security resilience

10.30 am - Morning Tea

WHAT ARE WE HERE FOR?

With thanks to Mediray and bioMérieux

11.00 am - Story of a genetically modified optimist

David Downs
Business leader, cancer battler, genetically modified organism, (ex) comedian and CEO, The New Zealand Story

In 2017/2018 David was facing a terminal diagnosis and given less than a year to live, but managed to beat cancer in a remarkable series of lucky breaks. After a year of chemotherapy, and staring a terminal diagnosis in the face, David got a literal lifeline, with the chance to get on to a clinical trial in the USA. Now a genetically modified cancer-killing machine, David's reflecting on the lucky series of events that saw him beat cancer, and on his new approach to life.

He's an ex-comedian, TV and Radio actor, semi-finalist for New Zealander of the Year, and a genetically modified optimist who documented his battle with cancer in the book A Mild Touch of the Cancer now a documentary film. His charity project Down with Cancer helps raise funds to make the revolutionary CAR T-cell therapy available in New Zealand for those who need it.

12.00 pm - RCPA: College for the future

Dr Elizabeth Roberts
Vice President, Royal College of Pathologist of Australasia

A glimpse at the past, present and future College. 

12.30 pm - Lunch

TESTING CLOSE TO THE PATIENT - WHAT IT TAKES

1.30 pm - Setting up PoC clinics in remote New Zealand

With thanks to Cepheid

Dr Jo-Ann Stanton
Associate Professor, National Centre for Women’s Health Research, Victoria University Wellington

It is increasingly possible for non-experts to perform complex molecular diagnostic screening tests at the point-of-care (PoC) (e.g. medical centres, mobile clinics, pharmacies). Off-the-shelf systems can be purchased easily but ensuring operating environments and quality assurance processes comply with codes of best practice to provide safe services for patients is also required. This is often not straight forward and on-ground conditions must be adapted to comply. For our research we set up three PoC clinics screening for HPV that complied with the New Zealand Best Practice Guidelines for Point-of-Care Testing. Facilitating compliance encompassed infrastructure review and modification, staff training and implementing performance measures. All facilities were in remote rural New Zealand primary care health centres with predominantly Māori and rural populations. The PoC platform chosen for this work was the Cepheid GeneXpert IV. Each clinic presented different challenges before they met the New Zealand best practice guidelines.  With technical oversight and consideration of the whole-of-clinic set up for a safe service, we demonstrated successful implementation of PoC screening in remote clinical settings.

Acknowledgement: Funding provided by the New Zealand Health Research Council 20/550 He Tapu Whare Tangata (HPV Rural Empowering).

2.00 pm - POCT in the community: an ecosystem

Dr Samarina Musaad
Chemical Pathologist, LabPlus, Te Whatu Ora, Te Toka Tumai - Auckland

By and large, point-of-care testing services in New Zealand hospitals have governance structures and Quality Management Systems in place; the same cannot be said for the community. For community point-of-care testing to be safe, relevant, effective, and cost-efficient, it needs a healthy eco-system. This “healthy” ecosystem involves breaking down silos of funding and of systems, alignment of funding with care pathways, integration of the care cycle from home-back to-home, abandoning false economies, and treating the human being behind the disease not (just) the disease. Foundations of a healthy ecosystem include an overarching point-of-care testing national governance structure for which New Zealand has the expertise, and a clear funding framework which is lacking. The emphasis is on the approach more so than the actual dollars. In other words, we need to get out of our comfort zones!

2.30 pm - Using point-of-care troponin tests to assess chest pain in rural and community settings throughout Aotearoa

Dr Rory Miller
Senior Lecturer, Department of GP and Rural Health, University of Otago, Thames Hospital

3.00 pm - Afternoon Tea

INNOVATION IS ALIVE - LETS CELEBRATE IT!

With thanks to Roche Diagnostics

3.30 pm - Innovation is Alive

A new quick-fire session designed to get a quick preview of innovative projects happening in the laboratory sector. Presenters will go up against one another in this energetic and competition style session. The judging panel will deliberate across the afternoon to select the winner, which will be presented at the evening dinner function. Thank you to Roche Diagnostics who have sponsored this session.

Innovation participants

Dr Michael Dunnet
Post-Doctoral Fellow, University of Otago

Victoria Salanoa
Quality and Compliance Co-ordinator, Awanui

Joshua Donn
Medical Laboratory Scientist, Techion NZ

Dr Indira Basu
Technical Specialist for Molecular Diagnostics, Awanui

Dr Asher Henry
Paediatric Fellow, Te Whatu Ora – Bay of Plenty

4.30 pm - Will AI Replace Laboratory Professionals and Pathologists?

Dr Tom Varghese
Sales and Marketing Manager, Aceso Health

My presentation, "Will AI Replace Laboratory Professionals and Pathologists?", explores the growing impact of artificial intelligence in pathology. It begins by addressing the global shortage of pathologists, which is expected to worsen, with a 30% decrease by 2030. AI is seen as a tool to ease the workload, though not as a replacement for human expertise. A key focus is the shift to digital pathology, where technologies like whole-slide imaging allow for more efficient analysis. AI aids in processing large datasets, but challenges like storage and data transfer remain. Rather than replacing pathologists, AI is expected to work alongside them, enhancing diagnostic accuracy and supporting precision medicine. Looking ahead, AI and computational pathology will play a larger role in diagnostics, but human oversight will remain crucial for interpreting AI outputs and ensuring sound clinical decisions.

5.00 pm - Closing Remarks

5.30 pm - Networking Drinks Function - with thanks to Sato New Zealand Ltd

6.30pm - Dinner Function - with thanks to BD

Day 2 - Thursday 26 September

8.45 am - Welcome Day Two – Reflections

EMERGING APPROACHES TO TESTING DELIVERY - WHAT IS ON THE HORIZON?

9.00 am - Direct-to-consumer testing: Supporting consumer values and preventing overutilisation

Dr Patti Shih
Senior Lecturer, Public Health, University of Wollongong

The market for direct-to-consumer testing is fast expanding. Consumers are keen to have more access and choice in their healthcare. Yet, among the growing variety of products, not all will be beneficial, and others may trigger overutilisation and other unintended consequences. How can we better support consumers and build public trust? In this session, I will identify some of the opportunities and pitfalls of direct-to-consumer testing, and overview findings from the latest social research in this emerging area. 

9.30 am - Safely Accelerating the Adoption of Precision Health Technologies in New Zealand

James Oughton
Chief Advisor of Precision Health (Genomics and AI), Ministry of Health Manatū Hauora

10.00 am - Designing an Efficient and Personalised Cervical Screening Program: The Future is Now

Dr Pearline Teo
Associate Director, Medical Affairs, BD

As countries progress on both HPV vaccination and HPV-based screening, more efficient and personalised triage methods for HPV-positive women with non16/18 genotypes are desired. HPV “extended genotyping” refers to the identification of individual HPV types or groups of types beyond just HPV16, 18, and 45. This session will explore the theory and evidence behind the use of HPV extended genotyping as a triage strategy, discuss risk stratification based on different HPV types, and present different screening algorithms that utilise extended genotyping around the world.

10.30 am - Morning Tea

WHAT DOES ‘PATIENT-CENTERED’ MEAN TO THE PATIENT?

11.00 am - Panel: How patients want to interact with health services: a cross-generational view

Facilitated by
Heather Phillips
Head of Corporate Affairs, Awanui

Our panel session dives into what ‘patient-centered’ really means from the perspective of the patient themselves. We will hear a cross-generational view from everyday kiwis from Gen Z, Millennial, Gen X and Baby Boomers about how they want to interact with health services, and in particular their diagnostic information.

12.00 pm - Patient-centric Pathology for Aotearoa

Dr Malcolm Mulholland
Chair, Patient Voice Aotearoa

12.30 pm - Lunch

THE HEALTH ECOSYSTEM

1.30 pm - Advancing Pathology Awareness in New Zealand: The Pathology Awareness Aotearoa Initiative

John Crothers
Executive, Pathology Awareness Australia

John Crothers is excited to launch the Pathology Awareness Aotearoa initiative, inspired by Australia's successful Know Pathology Know Healthcare campaign. This program aims to increase awareness and appreciation of pathology services in New Zealand through educational and promotional activities, such as workshops, seminars, and media engagement. Collaboration with medical professionals, consumer organisations, and patient groups is key to its success. The initiative seeks to engage New Zealand's pathology community in sharing the importance of their work, advocating for the profession, and enhancing its visibility to improve healthcare outcomes. John encourages support and participation to elevate pathology in healthcare discussions across the country.

2.00 pm - The Health Ecosystem

Toby Beaglehole
Chief Executive, Royal NZ College of General Practitioners

2.30 pm

3.00 pm - Closing remarks

Join us for a final networking drink at the Shed 22 on the waterfront.

See registration desk on the way out to get a drink on us.