Tag Archives: pathology

News

Important: Pathology Horizons 2021 Update

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An update from the event organisers:

After many conversations with various stakeholders and consideration of current global COVID travel guidelines we have taken the decision to cancel the in-person element of this year’s Pathology Horizons and to run a full day virtual event only on Friday 10th September from 09.15am- 18:00 (BST).   

The decision has been a difficult one and has been taken with the best interests of all our speakers and delegates in mind. We want to ensure that the conference remains a valuable event to attend, maximising knowledge sharing and networking. We will still offer a world class speaker list focusing on the future of pathology, and the conference will offer CPD accreditation.

This virtual event will be free of charge and will give you the chance to learn about new technologies, procedural developments and lines of research that are driving the future of pathology. You will hear about the possible pros and cons of these developments, how people in supporting disciplines should be preparing for and perhaps directing these changes.

For those of you who are unable to join us for the live presentations due to time differences, please note that all presentations will be recorded for you to view on demand.

Who should attend?

Pathology Horizons is open to anyone interested in the area of pathology e.g. Pathologists, Laboratory Managers, Laboratory Technicians and Biomedical Scientists.

Agenda

We are currently in the process of revising the agenda to fit within our full day schedule. The virtual conference is shaping up to be an impressive programme for our virtual event, covering a wide range of topics from an international panel of industry experts and thought leaders.

Here is a glimpse at some of the topics you can expect to hear about:

  • Computational Biomarkers
  • Advances in Digital Pathology
  • Slide free revolutions
  • Combined Spatial Transcriptomics
  • Patient Data from a personal perspective
  • Artificial Intelligence in Medical Imaging

Registration

Registration is now open for our virtual event!

You can register for the free conference by submitting your details though the link below.

Register Here

Keep up to date with the 2021 conference at www.pathologyhorizons.com and via our social media platforms.

If you have any queries relating to Pathology Horizons, please contact Rebecca Fitton directly at rfitton@cirdan.com.

We Look forward to welcoming you to our virtual event!

Stay safe and take care,

Team Cirdan

News

Pathology Horizons: Watch And Learn

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It is at a time like this when we really appreciate the work and developments that are taking place within the world of pathology and laboratory medicine. We realise just how much we depend on the pathologists and laboratory professionals for scientific answers and medical findings that are integral to many clinical decisions within healthcare organisations.

Recently, we have been looking back at speaker videos from Pathology Horizons conferences through the years and it’s amazing to see how many of these ideas are now a reality within laboratory operations. We are privileged to have had leading industry experts from across the world attend and speak at Pathology Horizons. The speakers have provided us with insightful knowledge on groundbreaking topics relating to new and emerging techniques, procedures and technologies that are driving the future of pathology.

We would like share some of these videos with you, beginning with a presentation on Computational Pathology by Dr. Liron Pantanowitz from University of Pittsburgh, USA which took place at Pathology Horizons 2017 in the beautiful Cairns, Australia. Dr. Pantanowitz is a well known Professor in the field of Pathology and Bioinformatics and is the Director of the Pathology Informatics Division at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC).

The presentation covers the pros and cons of computer aided diagnosis within Pathology and emphasises what is required to develop these much awaited applications. Can AI truly become a reality within Pathology? Can these deep learning tools perform the complex tasks of pathologists, and in some instances with superior accuracy?

View full presentation:

Dr. Liron Pantanowitz – Computer Aided Diagnosis in Pathology: Pros & Cons

News

Pathology Horizons 2020: Covid-19 Update

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We are pleased to announce that the Pathology Horizons 2020 conference is going ahead as planned in Newcastle, Northern Ireland from 10-12 September. 

Due to the uncertainty around the COVID-19 pandemic we have postponed the opening of Early Bird registration. We will keep you informed of when we plan to open this. We are hopeful that we will all be in a better place by September.

If anything changes we will update you as soon as possible.To ensure that you receive all communications about the conference please make sure that you pre-register.

Pathology Horizons

Pathology Horizons is an annual and open CPD conference organised by Cirdan to discuss what developments lie ahead in Pathology and what we can do to prepare or take advantage of these. 

This year the conference will take place in the beautiful Slieve Donard Resort & Spa located in the seaside town of Newcastle in N. Ireland. Nestling at the foot of the Mountains of Mourne, the Resort stands in six acres of immaculate private grounds. A golden strand of beach borders one side while the mighty Royal County Down Golf Links frames the other.  Located just 30 miles south of Belfast and 90 miles north of Dublin, it is a fantastic location to mix pleasure and business at this year’s pathology Horizons event. 

“It is truly unique in the way that you support innovation, this kind of conference does not exist anywhere else… you showcase all the good and new things that are coming in pathology. Top organisation and very good speakers!”

Dr. Laszlo Igali
Norfolk and Norwich University Hospitals NHS

Registration

If you would like to be notified when Pathology Horizons 2020 registration opens, please click here.

News

Grahame Grieve to talk Interoperability at Pathology Horizons 2019

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We are delighted to announce that Grahame Grieve from Health Intersections Pty Ltd, Australia will speak on the topic of interoperability at Pathology Horizons 2019.

Grahame Grieve is HL7’s Product Director for “FHIR” – the leading healthcare data exchange standard of the future. Grahame has a background in laboratory medicine, software vendor development, clinical research, open source development and has also conceived, developed and sold interoperability and clinical document solutions and products in the Australian market and around the world. Grahame has worked to develop standards and solutions with several US vendor consortiums, and the national programs of Canada, England, Singapore, Vietnam, and Australia.

Pathology Horizons 2019

Pathology Horizons is an annual and open CPD conference organised by Cirdan to discuss what developments lie ahead in Pathology and what we can do to prepare or take advantage of these.

This year the conference will take place in the exquisite Heritage Hotel Queenstown, New Zealand. The vistas from Heritage Queenstown are awe-inspiring – soak in the view of the towering Remarkables mountain range, rising from the rippling waters of Lake Wakatipu from the comfort of the hotel. Crafted from centuries-old schist stone and cedar, this comfortable and sophisticated Queenstown hotel is the perfect place to mix business and pleasure.

If you would like to be notified when Pathology Horizons 2019 registration opens, please click here.

News, Uncategorized

Hear from Prof. Armes on the future of genome sequencing

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Prof. Jane Armes, NSW Health Pathology, Australia spoke on “Genome Sequencing as a Diagnostic Aid” at the recent Pathology Horizons 2018 conference in N.Ireland.

In the short interview below filmed  after her presentation, Prof. Armes talks a little bit about her background, where she believes the future of genome sequencing lies, the challenges ahead and gives her thoughts on the Pathology Horizons conference.

About Pathology Horizons

Pathology Horizons is an annual CPD conference, which draws an international audience and is focused on the future of pathology. Delegates learn about new technologies, lines of research and procedural developments that are driving the future of pathology.

Unlike other larger pathology conferences, Pathology Horizons has just one conference stream allowing attendees to network more easily with both speakers and delegates.

Pathology Horizons 2019

The 2019 conference takes place in The Heritage, Queenstown, New Zealand from 8-10 August. Due to the boutique nature of this conference, places are limited. To keep informed of the agenda and when early bird registration opens, pre-register here.

 

2018, event, News

Application and Implementation of AI Driven Screening Processes in Pathology

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Dr. Donal O’Shea, Deciphex

Developing deep learning models that account for all variants of abnormality in a given tissue slide can be a challenge requiring extensive and time consuming annotation of thousands of pathology slides by experienced pathologists. The process also needs to effectively account for tissue processing variance and digital pathology scanner selection, which is almost infinite due to the extensive range of interchangeable unit operations available for the pathology lab.

In scenarios where a high percentage of normal content presents, we propose a generalised model for abnormality detection to help identify abnormal content of interest and support the elimination of normal cases from the workflow.  The generalised model as proposed is developed solely from normal cases, requires no annotation of slides as a result and can be rapidly tailored to account for inter-laboratory processing variance.

During his presentation,“Finding Normals: Application and Implementation AI Driven Screen Processes in Pathology”, Dr. O’Shea will discuss how such approaches can be leveraged, useful application segments for the technology and how he foresees this capability being embodied in software workflows.

View more on Dr. Donal O’Shea

About Pathology Horizons

Pathology Horizons is taking place from 13-15 September 2018 at the Lough Erne Resort in N.Ireland. It is a unique CPD conference, organised by Cirdan that looks at what lies ahead in pathology. Delegates will learn about new technologies, lines of research and procedural developments that are driving the future of pathology. View Agenda

Please note that given the nature of this boutique style conference that there are only a limited number of places available. If planning on attending booking soon is advisable. Register here

2018, News

Pathology Horizons – It’s almost time!

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With just over two months to go until the next Pathology Horizons conference excitement is starting to build. Here’s some insight into why there is such a buzz around this event.

What’s it all about?

Pathology Horizons is an annual CPD conference organised by Cirdan, which focuses on what lies ahead in pathology. Delegates attending this unique event, now in its fourth year will learn about new technologies, lines of research and procedural developments that are driving the future of pathology.

Unlike other larger pathology events, Pathology Horizons is a boutique conference with only one conference stream, allowing delegates and speakers to interact easily with each other, providing an excellent networking and learning environment.

International Experts and Groundbreaking Topics

A first class panel of speakers from across the globe, including some of the best minds in the areas of pathology, laboratory medicine and personal and organisational development have been lined up to deliver presentations. Some talks to look forward to include:

  • Virtual and Augmented Reality in Digital Pathology
  • Application of Liquid Biopsy to the Detection and Treatment of Ovarian Cancer
  • Genome Sequencing as a Diagnostic Aid
  • Emerging Neuropathology Diagnostics: Genetic Scaffolds, Phenotypes and Advanced Imaging
  • Advancing Diagnostic Pathology: Impact of Digital Pathology and Artificial Intelligence Tools
  • Extreme Makeover: Creating Pathology Reports that Make a Difference

View full agenda

Who’s attending?

The conference is open to anyone interested in the area of pathology and laboratory medicine, for example Pathologists, Biomedical Scientists and other Laboratory Professionals. Confirmed delegates this year are coming from as far afield as New Zealand and work in a mix of clinical, academic and industry settings.

What’s in it for me?

As well as the obvious learning and networking opportunities delegates can earn CPD credits for attending. The conference has been CPD certified and is approved by the Royal College of Pathologists for nine CPD credits. The added bonus is that you can get all of this professional development in a relaxed and fun environment within a five star luxury resort.

Where is Pathology Horizons being held?

The conference is being held in the Lough Erne Resort, one of Northern Ireland’s finest hotels, just outside Enniskillen in Co. Fermanagh.

What can I expect?

Here’s a quick overview of last year’s conference in Cairns, Australia. Please note having a world-class golf course onsite is not a mandatory requirement when selecting a Pathology Horizons venue 🙂

Hear from some past delegates and speakers

How can I join the conference?

For details on how to register go to www.pathologyhorizons.com/register There is always a lot of interest in this unique event and demand has been greater than ever before this year. If you are interested in attending please book soon as there are a limited amount of places remaining.

2018, News

Genome Sequencing as a Diagnostic Aid

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There is wide acceptance of the concept of genotype-phenotype correlation in cancers. This concept has been extensively explored in breast carcinogenesis. Early work identified a strong phenotypic signature of breast cancer, which arose in patients with germline BRCA1 mutation. Subsequent data identified four broad intrinsic subtypes of breast cancer, with one being a group of “basal-like” breast cancers, referring to their over-expression of basal cytokeratin markers. Over time, and with transition of intrinsic subtyping to the clinic, the concept of triple-negative breast cancers (i.e., not expressing ER, PR or HER2 by IHC or ISH) evolved as a phenotypic surrogate for “”basal-like” breast cancers. This surrogate was acceptable, given that therapeutic targets available in breast cancer were limited to those directed at the ER/PR pathway and HER2, neither of which were expressed in basal-like breast cancers.

The genomes of several cohorts of triple negative breast cancer have since been analysed. It is clear that they are a heterogeneous group of cancers at the molecular level, with general agreement that some remain true to the basal-like genotype, whilst others have a predominant “immune-activated” or a “mesenchymal” genomic footprint. Still others are nominated “luminal androgen receptor” and are non-basal-like in their molecular profile.

Concomitantly, there has been evolving interest in targeted therapies for TNBC, including targets for basal-like and luminal androgen receptor breast cancers. However, there has been little application of this refined molecular stratification of TNBC in the clinic, possibly due to inaccessibility of genomic analysis for the majority of breast cancers and the fact that the morphological correlates of these TNBC remain under-explored. New technologies, including digital imaging of histology phenotypes, can potentially be recruited to help determine phenotypic subgroups of TNBC relevant to their genotype and therefore their potential targeted therapies. It is possible that these digitally-discovered phenotypes can be applied to stratify TNBC in the routine clinical setting.

Prof. Jane Armes, Clinical Director at NSW Health Pathology in Australia will be discussing further at Pathology Horizons 2018.

About Pathology Horizons

Pathology Horizons is an annual CPD conference that focuses on what lies ahead in pathology. This unique event allows delegates to learn about new technologies, procedural developments and lines of research that are driving the future of Pathology. Unlike other larger pathology conferences, it is a boutique event with only one conference stream. This enables delegates to interact and network with each other as well as with the expert international panel of expert speakers.

Date: 13-15 September 2018

Venue: Lough Erne Resort, N.Ireland

View full agenda
Early Bird ends 31/5/18 – View details on how to register

2018, News

Dr. Bankhead to speak on how novel open source software platform is revolutionizing digital pathology image analysis

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We are delighted to welcome Research Scientist,  Dr. Peter Bankhead to our expert panel of speakers for Pathology Horizons 2018.

Innovation increasingly relies on open tools, standards and software, empowering researchers to test new ideas and make new discoveries.  Reproducibility and standardization in science also crucially depend upon analysis methods being made freely available.

Until recently, digital pathology suffered from the lack of a software platform that would make these things possible.  Faced with a choice between attempting to analyze whole slide images using commercial systems (often prohibitively expensive) or by applying generic open source software (often prohibitively complex), much biomarker analysis in practice continued to be based on visual estimation by pathologists, which is laborious and known to have limited reproducibility.

QuPath was developed to address these issues, and represents the first widely-used, powerful, flexible, extensible and user-friendly open source platform for whole slide image analysis.  Since its release at the end of 2016, QuPath has been downloaded more than 10 000 times and is used worldwide by research groups in both academia and industry.

A central goal of QuPath is to provide the tools for pathologists and image analysts to better work together, advancing the field more rapidly.

During  his presentation at Pathology Horizons, Dr. Bankhead will outline some of the reasons behind QuPath’s success so far, and describe features currently in development that are set to greatly expand its scope and reach for digital pathology and bioimage analysis applications in the near future.

Why attend Pathology Horizons?

The conference is set to be another interesting and extremely informative event with a range of top international speakers demonstrating the power of new technologies, updates on procedural developments and valuable new lines of research – all in a relaxed and open atmosphere! Unlike other larger pathology events, Pathology Horizons is a boutique conference with one conference stream, which allows you to interact and network fully with the delegates and speakers. The conference is also CPD certified and has been awarded with 9 CPD credits by The Royal College of Pathologists.

Some other topics from speakers include: 

  • Artificial intelligence and what it means for healthcare and patholgy
  • Liquid biopsy and what it can do for detecting/treating ovarian cancer
  • Virtual and augmented reality in digital pathology
  • Genome sequencing as a diagnostic aid

View  full Agenda.

Don’t miss out, secure your place today!

Pathology Horizons 2018                                                                                    Lough Erne Resort, N. Ireland                                                                                        13-15th September

2018, News

Radiology and Pathology Integration – Opportunities Outweigh the Challenges

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In recent years, advances in the field of diagnostic medicine have provided enormous benefits to patients with cancer.  However, the increase in complexity of new testing modalities in pathology and radiology has also led to new challenges in gathering all essential information and forming a coherent diagnostic message for a given case.

Opportunities for optimal patient care may be lost, and diagnostic errors might not be prevented, without a formal integration of the various testing modalities in pathology and radiology.  During his presentation at Pathology Horizons 2018, Dr. Wallace will discuss the challenges of pathology and radiology correlation in the current diagnostic paradigm and the numerous opportunities for improved workflows and patient outcomes with an effective diagnostic integration process.

Dr. W. Dean Wallace  is a Professor of Pathology at the UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine in Los Angeles, California. He is the chief of pulmonary and renal pathology services and is recognised as an expert in the fields of transplant pathology and lung cancer diagnostics. Dr. Wallace is also the Director of the UCLA Telepathology and Digital Pathology Centre and co-led the team that created the innovative, first of its kind, Integrated Diagnostic Report (IDR) that combines multiple radiology and pathology studies into one dynamic reporting platform. Dr. Wallace has authored several dozen peer-reviewed papers and book chapters and was lead editor of a textbook in the field of transplant pathology.

Why attend Pathology Horizons?

The conference is set to be another interesting and  informative event with a range of top international speakers demonstrating the power of new technologies, updates on procedural developments and valuable new lines of research – all in a relaxed and open atmosphere! Unlike other larger pathology events, Pathology Horizons is a boutique conference with one conference stream, which allows you to interact and network fully with the delegates and speakers. The conference is also CPD certified and has been awarded with 9 CPD credits by The Royal College of Pathologists.

Some other topics from speakers include: 

  • Artificial intelligence and what it means for healthcare and patholgy
  • Liquid biopsy and what it can do for detecting/treating ovarian cancer
  • Virtual and augmented reality in digital pathology
  • Genome sequencing as a diagnostic aid

Please note places for the conference are limited. If you are planning on attending, booking soon is advisable.  Register here

Pathology Horizons 2018                                                                                    Lough Erne Resort, N. Ireland                                                                                        13-15th September