Take advantage of this special opportunity to interact with peers and speakers. While enjoying breakfast, you’ll share ideas regarding common problems and issues. Each roundtable discussion is focused on one general topic to allow for active discussion among participants after a brief introduction by the roundtable facilitator. On Friday you can choose to participate in one of four topics, and Saturday offers a choice of 10.

There is an additional $___ fee for participating in the Breakfast Roundtable Discussions. Space at each table is limited and will be filled on a first-come, first-served basis. So be sure to register early for this engaging exchange.

Friday Roundtables
1. Workplace Ethics
Facilitator: Kathleen Sazama
2. Change Management from a Quality Perspective
Facilitator: Lucia Berte
3. Conflict Resolution
Facilitator: Susan South
4. Staff Scheduling
Facilitator: Ana Hooker

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Discuss solutions to common problems.

The JCAHO requires documentation of the continuing competency of laboratory personnel on a regular basis. Other regulatory and standards-setting agencies, such as HCFA (CLIA'88), CAP, AABB, and COLA, also have specific requirements for competency assessment. Can you design a program that is compliant with regulatory and standards-setting agencies? How often should competency assessments be performed and how should failures be handled?

Attend this session to understand the competency regulations and learn effective and efficient strategies to meet the requirements. Learn how proficiency testing is used to legally comply with competency assessment regulations.

In this presentation, you'll develop a competency plan, suitable for use in your own laboratory, which involves wet competency assessment, direct observation, record reviews, and problem-solving assessment. Guidelines on writing acceptable and effective test questions will be included, as well as suggestions for maintaining an ongoing program. Assessment of Point-of-Care Testing personnel and age-specific competencies will also be addressed. The course material will provide you with numerous examples of assessments and forms for documenting competency.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• List the regulatory and accrediting agencies that require competency assessment.
• Describe the assessment methods required by the regulatory and standards-setting agencies.
• State the frequency with which competency assessment must be performed.
• Identify the personnel and tasks that must be included in a competency assessment program.
• Create forms to document competency assessments.
• Discuss methods for maintaining a competency assessment schedule.

Praise from past attendees:
“Broadened my knowledge of what is needed. Gave me tools to use in defining our program.” – Holly Presley

“Our lab has a lot of work to do! This has given me some concrete directions to head in.”

“We are in the process of updating our competency system. This workshop gave great ideas and insight on how to strengthen what we have done.” – Jennifer Stanislawski

“A really useful and wonderful session. I am planning to use a lot of this info when I return to work.” – Kathy Fauntleroy

Direct from the speaker about the patient safety aspects of her session:
Competency assessment is a core element of a patient safety program. A well trained staff whose competence is verified on a consistent basis is much less likely to make the kinds of errors that place patients in danger of receiving the wrong treatment.

Laboratory leadership, supervision, and coordination today require a diverse level of knowledge and control. This program will give you an excellent foundation to address challenges that you face on a daily basis until you actually get your advanced degree! You will receive a concise, systematic overview of the following:

• Finance 101: Labor justification, variance analysis, capital justification, fixed and variable costs, cost-per-test, break-even analysis, and benchmarking.
• Reimbursement 101: Methods of reimbursement, Medicare, HMO's, coding and Medical Necessity, and Local Medical Review policies.
• Regulatory 101: Elements of CLIA, the essentials of regulatory agencies, inspection preparation.
• Human Resources 101: The law, recruitment processes, compensation/benefits, performance management, disciplinary or corrective actions, unions, and labor relations.
• Performance Improvement/Quality Control 101: Principles and statistics of quality control, fundamental tools for performance improvement programs.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Utilize financial concepts, including capital vs. operating budgets, cost accounting, and benchmarking.
• Describe reimbursement topics such as methods of reimbursement and compliance.
• Discuss CLIA '88, regulatory agencies, inspection preparation, and other regulatory issues.
• Use management theory, recruitment strategies, performance management techniques, and other human resource applications.

Praise from past attendees:
“Donna MacMillan is an excellent speaker! Her style and presentation are informative and easy to follow.”

“This has been one of the best presentations I have ever attended at [such an] event. Thank you.”

Cost-effective laboratory services have been shaped by competition and managed care. Patient safety and process outcomes are the mandates of regulatory agencies. Attend this session to discover how these two seemingly at-odds imperatives can be reconciled. You’ll gain the tools you need to optimize your laboratory processes efficiently and economically.

Accelerate your laboratory’s performance with a process improvement model. Development of flowcharts and cause-and-effect diagrams will target opportunities for improvement, and identify relevant data to serve as a catalyst for change. Illustrative case histories will challenge your knowledge and reinforce applied principles.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Identify opportunities for improvement using a prioritization matrix
• Apply a systematic method of process improvement using FOCUS-PDCA
• Describe and apply basic performance improvement tools
• Define the role and impact of variation in processes

Supervisors and team leaders provide the inspiration and impetus that guide diverse laboratorians to provide timely and high-quality laboratory services. If you are preparing to step into a leadership role, if you’ve recently been promoted, or if you want to become a more versatile employee, attend this session to gain leadership skills beyond your technical skills and training. You will learn how to best employ the strengths of different generations of laboratorians and how to deal with conflict in a constructive manner. These skills will help team leaders improve productivity in the laboratory, resulting in better patient care.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Analyze responses to conflict and develop an effective action plan to deal with difficult personalities and handle confrontation.
• Describe and contrast the characteristics of the multiple generations in the work force today.
• Make the most out of the cardinal employee strengths of each generation in the workplace.

Meet new people! Build relationships! We’ll make it easy for you. Bring your coffee to a specially designated comfortable area of the hotel to meet other like-minded participants. Each day we’ll have small group networking niches where you can find people to whom you can relate and who can help support you in your professional endeavors. Take advantage of the “exchange” in ASCP Leadership Exchange!

Reduce laboratory error and improve your laboratory quality! This session will reinforce the building blocks you need to construct a solid quality control (QC) foundation for your laboratory results. Tips for applying both old and new tools and illustrative case studies will add further perspectives to help cement the answers to your QC questions.
 
Five important topics will be discussed:

-Interpretation of monthly reports to assess imprecision and bias
-QC rule planning – lessons from the Power Function Graphs
-Linear regression for method comparison – evaluating changes due to new reagent formulations
-Introduction to Total Error (TE) and Total Allowable Error (TEa). How are the concepts related? 
-Combining these QC planning concepts and applications to monitor laboratory error more effectively, thereby improving patient testing.

Following this workshop, you will be able to:

• Describe Total Allowable Error.
• Discuss cause and effect of trends, shifts and bias.
• Apply appropriate tools to monitor laboratory error and enhance quality.

Change is easy: it happens to us all. It’s adapting that’s hard. The majority of change initiatives fail because of one common denominator—people. People fear what they don’t understand and cling to what they know or what is comfortable. How successful were substantive changes that occurred in your laboratory? Were most employees resistant to change? Did the changes “stick”?

Using examples from the Endurance saga, this program will explore change and your role in accomplishing a positive and productive attitude to change. You’ll discover the three “Ds” to successful change. Plus, you’ll take part in discussions on leadership, personal responsibility, and the “20-30-50 rule”/stakeholder selection. Attending this session will ensure that your next change initiative is not only successful but also sustainable and will stimulate innovation throughout your organization.  

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Describe the difference between “change” and “changing” and why the latter is so difficult.
• Discuss the three “Ds” for successful change.
• Explain the one factor that must be present for successful and sustainable change.

Everyone has a fire within. Your success as a leader depends on creating bonfires in others in support of your message. Or will your attempts at “motivation” douse the blaze? This dynamic and inspiring presentation will dispel motivation myths and disclose tactical methods to fan the flames of cooperation whenever you need them.

When Carmen Mariano was six years old, his father said, “Carmen, whatever you do, stay in school.” Carmen listened to his dad—and has stayed in school as a student, teacher, coach, or administrator for fifty-three years!

Carmen is the Assistant Superintendent of the Quincy, Massachusetts, Public Schools. He has addressed audiences in 22 states and five countries. Neither his Master’s degree from Harvard University nor his Doctorate from Boston College has cured Carmen of his Boston accent, but both have taught him something about motivation.

The major laboratory accrediting organizations rank these problems as the most common deficiencies found:

• No documents
• Outdated documents
• Incomplete documents
• Different versions of the same document

Documents are management's guidance to staff on how work is performed consistently and efficiently. Do you hear comments by staff that your laboratory's documents are too long, incomplete, or inconsistent, and that much important information is buried or missing? Attend this session to accomplish two essential goals at once—have faultless documents for the inspectors AND useful, organized resources for your staff, too! Good documents support patient safety by providing staff with the processes and procedures necessary to do the job right the first time.

This workshop presents a fresh approach to the four different types of documents and their uses in the medical laboratory. The requirements for documents, including the new and updated NCCLS guideline, are reviewed with suggestions on document management and control. Electronic solutions to document creation, review, and management are emphasized, including how key features of document management software programs can work in your laboratory environment.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Obtain and apply the various regulatory and accreditation requirements for documents.
• Describe four different document types and their relationship in the document hierarchy.
• Explain eight dimensions of a document control program that need to be managed.
• Use key features to choose software to assist in document control.

Praise from past attendees:
"The information provided a new paradigm for documenting laboratory processes and procedures."

"Showed me a new way of doing things."

The major laboratory accrediting organizations rank these problems as the most common deficiencies found:

• No documents
• Outdated documents
• Incomplete documents
• Different versions of the same document

Documents are management's guidance to staff on how work is performed consistently and efficiently. Do you hear comments by staff that your laboratory's documents are too long, incomplete, or inconsistent, and that much important information is buried or missing? Attend this session to accomplish two essential goals at once—have faultless documents for the inspectors AND useful, organized resources for your staff, too! Good documents support patient safety by providing staff with the processes and procedures necessary to do the job right the first time.

If your staff does not learn from their mistakes, they're bound to repeat them, and eventually your laboratory may face legal action! The speaker—a medical technologist, pathologist, and attorney - will demonstrate how laboratory professionals can interrupt this cycle and reduce error in the laboratory.

The basic legal processes that apply to laboratory errors will be described. You will learn how significant errors are viewed in the legal arena. Through case-based examples, the presentation will highlight opportunities for identifying and characterizing errors, and, of utmost importance, utilizing them to implement staff education and process improvement and for patient safety. Actual laboratory scenarios will guide you in performing gap analyses of your current practices with an eye toward minimizing significant error-prone events.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Recognize significant errors in laboratory practice.
  
• Describe the legal implications of how errors are identified, characterized, and used for learning/prevention.
  
• Summarize the legal process as applied to laboratory errors.
  
• Apply gap analysis techniques to current laboratory practices to minimize errors and improve patient safety.
  
• Discuss error management in terms of risk avoidance and legal minimization.

Praise from past attendees:

“Very practical, straightforward information.” – Karen Getzy

“I enjoyed her stories that made the points of her lecture. Many questions were raised, and her answers were well thought out.”

In today's healthcare environment, hiring the right person for the job and retaining that employee are skills critical to your success. If you became a supervisor with excellent clinical training but limited preparation to address the personnel issues of your new responsibilities, this program is for you!

You'll gain skills crucial to successful human resource administration, including:

-Appropriately defining the job to be done.
-Gathering necessary information about candidates while staying within legal limitations.
-Making the most of orientation.
-The challenges of diverse, multigenerational, multicultural workplace.

This program will provide reality-based, tried-and-true tools for successfully hiring, orienting, and retaining the most valuable resource utilized by our laboratories today—people.

Following this session, you will be able to:

• Define the personnel hiring process and the means to successful implementation of each step.
• Discuss the legislation governing employment issues.
• Apply the appropriate techniques for resolving various employee issues.
• Acquire the most information legally attainable from job applicants.
• Implement mechanisms that focus on retaining valuable employees in an environment of change and dwindling resources.

Praise from past attendees:
“Speaker was full of energy, gave many great examples, and made this session enjoyable.”
“Workshop was great in giving you guidelines in how to interview.”
“What a joy! Ann has a great and exciting attitude! The reminders and refreshers were helpful and re-invigorating. Thanks.”
“Great examples for dealing with people—good insight”

The major laboratory accrediting organizations rank these problems as the most common deficiencies found:

• No documents
• Outdated documents
• Incomplete documents
• Different versions of the same document

Documents are management's guidance to staff on how work is performed consistently and efficiently. Do you hear comments by staff that your laboratory's documents are too long, incomplete, or inconsistent, and that much important information is buried or missing? Attend this session to accomplish two essential goals at once—have faultless documents for the inspectors AND useful, organized resources for your staff, too! Good documents support patient safety by providing staff with the processes and procedures necessary to do the job right the first time.

The major laboratory accrediting organizations rank these problems as the most common deficiencies found:

• No documents
• Outdated documents
• Incomplete documents
• Different versions of the same document

Documents are management's guidance to staff on how work is performed consistently and efficiently. Do you hear comments by staff that your laboratory's documents are too long, incomplete, or inconsistent, and that much important information is buried or missing? Attend this session to accomplish two essential goals at once—have faultless documents for the inspectors AND useful, organized resources for your staff, too! Good documents support patient safety by providing staff with the processes and procedures necessary to do the job right the first time.

The major laboratory accrediting organizations rank these problems as the most common deficiencies found:

• No documents
• Outdated documents
• Incomplete documents
• Different versions of the same document

Documents are management's guidance to staff on how work is performed consistently and efficiently. Do you hear comments by staff that your laboratory's documents are too long, incomplete, or inconsistent, and that much important information is buried or missing? Attend this session to accomplish two essential goals at once—have faultless documents for the inspectors AND useful, organized resources for your staff, too! Good documents support patient safety by providing staff with the processes and procedures necessary to do the job right the first time.