The World Health Organization estimates 3.7 billion people under age 50 (67%) globally have herpes simplex virus type 1 (HSV-1) infection, the main cause of oral herpes, and 491 million people aged 15–49 (13%) worldwide have a herpes simplex virus type 2 (HSV-2) infection, the main cause of genital herpes.  Although treatable, most HSV infections are often asymptomatic or unrecognized.  Moreover, management of HSV infections is complicated by overlapping clinical presentation of unrelated herpesvirus infections, such as varicella-zoster virus (VZV), requiring differential diagnosis.  Innovations in molecular diagnostics continue to play a critical role in the diagnosis and management of these diseases.

About Our Speaker: 

Lori Henderson earned a bachelor’s degree in biology from Bucknell University. She began her career in the laboratory working on drug discovery and then transitioned into commercial roles within the biopharma and diagnostics sectors of the life science industry. Lori has direct experience in multiple disease and therapeutic areas and currently focuses on sexually transmitted diseases and women’s health. Within the molecular business unit at QuidelOrtho, Lori is responsible for identifying and helping drive the development of products to meet clinical and patient needs.

Sickle cell disease (SCD) patients are at risk of developing multiple complications from transfusions, including alloimmunization to red blood cell antigens, delayed hemolytic transfusion reactions and hyperhemolysis syndrome (HHS). While HHS is a rare complication of repeat blood transfusions in patients with SCD, clinicians and the laboratory have important roles in its detection and management. In this podcast, Wally R. Smith, MD, the inaugural Florence Neal Cooper Smith Professor of Sickle Cell Disease at Virginia Commonwealth University shares insights to screening for and managing HHS.

About Our Speaker: 

Wally R. Smith, MD, is an experienced implementation scientist and expert in clinical and health services research in sickle cell disease (SCD). He serves as Vice Chair for Research of the Division of General Internal Medicine at Virginia Commonwealth University (VCU) and was Scientific Director of the Center on Health Disparities at VCU. Dr. Smith has authored over 100 publications and served as an investigator on over 50 grants and contracts. He has been principal investigator on 26 federal or foundation-funded grants and contracts including: Pain in Sickle Cell Epidemiology Study (PiSCES), the largest and most detailed adult cohort that changed our understanding of SCD pain in adults and, since 2012, Start Healing in Patients with Hydroxyurea, the first-ever randomized controlled trial of implementation science in SCD.

Six Sigma is a popular way to measure quality. Sigma metrics have been adapted for the clinical laboratory by incorporating observed accuracy, precision and total error allowed (TEa). In vitro diagnostic (IVD) manufacturers have used Six Sigma to assess the quality of their assays using a small number of well-controlled systems to generate the data. QuidelOrtho has developed a novel approach to assess laboratory Sigma metrics for a broad range of assays using data from over 1,300 Vitros® instruments used in clinical labs. 

In this podcast, Johanna Miller, data scientist at QuidelOrtho, discusses the value of using real-world data to perform Sigma metric studies and how a lab can use this information. 

About Our Speaker: 

Johanna Miller holds a bachelor's degree in biomedical engineering from the University of Rochester and a master's in product development and data science from the Rochester Institute of Technology. She spent 10 years developing expertise on Vitros systems and the data it generates, while working in product development. Currently, she focuses on developing new and interesting methods to use data at QuidelOrtho - specifically to bring insights directly to labs using Six Sigma quality scores.