Visit the Exhibit Hall

Session Summary

Transitioning Board Governance to our new Chairperson and assuring continuity of leadership as we take the next steps, together toward to tomorrow.

Learning Objectives

1. Upon completion, participant will be able to describe the progress for existing board intiatives.
2. Upon completion, participant will be able to describe new board intiatives.
3. Upon completion, participant will be able to identify the 2021-2023 Board of Governors.

Diana H. Buck, M.Ed., MBA, CTBS, Sr. Vice President Tissue Donation Services

Ronda J. Horstman, BS, CTBS, Vice President, Recovery Partner Services

Session Summary

For industries to drive mission and individual organizational success, the future is unequivocal: full integration of diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) must be a cornerstone of the foundation. As an organizational imperative, DEI is not a fad; it’s here to stay. Focusing on DEI is not only the right and socially responsible thing for an organization to do, but also what is best for our industry and organizational mission success. Organizations must change to effectively serve their community, becoming the same rich tapestry that is the community. Our challenge is to create systems for generations to come. Sustained effort in the DEI sphere has positive bottom-line benefits – and in the organ and tissue donation industry, our bottom line is ‘more lives saved and enhanced’

Learning Objectives

1. The learner will be able to articulate the principles of diversity.
2. The learner will be able to give examples of equity.
3. The learner will be able to explain organizational benefits of inclusive practice.
4. The learner will be able to give examples of OPO successes in authorization practices.
5. The learner will speak to changing demographic trends in terms of ethnicity, gender and age.

Janice Whaley, MPH, CPTC, CTBS, President and CEO

Session Summary

A donor family’s walk-through Organ and Tissue Donation.

Learning Objectives

1. Upon completion participants will learn about Candler David Smith and his choice to be an organ and tissue donor.
2. Upon completion participants will understand the donor family’s walk through organ and tissue donation.
3. Upon completion participants will learn about grief and the continued walk of hope and healing through organ and tissue donation.
4. Upon completion participants will describe advocacy work and list its healing properties.

Trina Long, Donor Mom

Session Summary

Join us for a joint perspective on the PHS changes for Organ Donors with regards to high risk criteria and how it relates to Tissue criteria. Members of the leadership team at New England Donor Services will discuss shared Organ and Tissue cases and how to navigate the differences in tissue and organ eligibility.

Learning Objectives

1. Upon completion, participants will be able to summarize the PHS high-risk changes to organ donor criteria.
2. Upon completion, participants will be able to compare and contrast the differences in high-risk organ and tissue criteria.
3. Upon completion, participants will be able to list the ways in which they can apply the concepts reviewed to their own Tissue Bank or OPO.

Joshua Brennan, CTBS, Director, Tissue Operations

Samantha Endicott, MPH, CPTC, Regional Director - Boston

Session Summary

Children of all ages have long been described as the "forgotten mourners" during grief work among families. Within the donation and transplantation environment, we have the opportunity to change the pathway of grief and make donation conversations a part of the healing of these children. Indiana Donor Network has developed a children's journey to capture the education and support that should be woven into Aftercare programming. We do this to prioritize that the most vulnerable members of donor families are given a place to grow and thrive.

Learning Objectives

1. Identify the variety of ways that children are represented through the donation experience
2. Recognize the opportunity to create a specialized grief journey program for the bereavement process of children
3. Introduce the Indiana Donor Network Children’s Support Journey
4. Reflect on the long term impact when children recognize the hope and healing found through donation and transplantation – creating a donor hero story!

Jamie M. Rivas, MSW LCSW, Director of Family and Donor Services

The AATB Donor Family Services Council surveyed representatives that manage donor family and tissue recipient correspondences from AATB Accredited organizations to understand the current landscape nationally, identify existing best practices, and examine the reasons for low percentage of participation of tissue recipients writing donor families. In addition, interviews were conducted with representatives from organizations with high and low participating correspondence programs, organizations without correspondence programs and organizations that feel a more robust program can be achieved. Results of the donor family and tissue recipient correspondence survey and interviews will be shared.

Learning Objectives:

• List the three goals as to why the AATB Donor Family Services Council created a task force focused on Donor Family and Recipient Correspondence for Tissue Exclusive Donors.
• Outline barriers that create the greatest disconnect with tissue recipients corresponding with tissue-exclusive donor families.
• List effective strategies to improve or implement a tissue recipient correspondence program.
• Modify or build best practices for the Tissue Recipient Correspondence program by learning from two high-performing tissue establishments.

Deborah Hutt, MS, Director, Donor Family Services

​Patricia Darrigan, CTBS,

Lauralee Brown, RN, MHSA, CPHQ,

Over the years many processes have become universal. The main reason for this is consistency. Consistency is a key factor in the ever-changing field of Tissue Recovery. Transitioning to a universal prep process has many benefits and can help a Tissue Recovery Organization establish much-needed consistency, as well as produce great results. When you perform the same process every time, other parts of the tissue recovery process tend to fall into place. This presentation will guide those who are interested in developing and implementing their own universal prep process.
Learning Objectives:

Identify indicators that a Universal Prep may be helpful

Discover the benefits of using a Universal Prep

Develop and implement a plan to transition into performing a Universal Prep

Angela Montgomery, CST, CTBS, Manager of Tissue Recovery

Brooke Gale, CST, CTBS, Tissue Procurement Trainer

Ryan Nelson, BS, CTBS, Tissue Recovery Supervisor and Medical Examiner Liaison

Session Summary

2021 AATB Virtual Annual Conference – December 2021 Dagmar Climo/Speaker – Family Support in a Virtual World Outline The LifeGift Aftercare Team has continued serving our donor families with meaningful support throughout the pandemic. We have developed a number of virtual activities/events to engage with our families. 2020 & 2021 aftercare activities I will present in the AATB presentation via PowerPoint include: • A virtual LifeGift webinar series for donor family members on a variety of topics including an inaugural Navigating Grief During the Holidays webinar LifeGift’s aftercare team and a licensed grief counselor held in October 2021. • Hosted virtual family meetings throughout the year including the Emerson/Sullivan first-time meeting for which we collaborated with MORA - https://bit.ly/2ZLC1h9 • Virtually hosted a first-time donor family/heart recipient meeting which LifeGift then positioned to Houston KTRK/ABC-13 resulting in a longer than normal 5-minute 10 p.m. broadcast and a 12-minute story version which was posted on ABC network’s Localish platform. 2 families forever connected by 1 heart - ABC13 Houston • Hosted various donor family virtual events including a holiday choir event, rock painting how-two webinar, weekly coffee chats and activities centered around LifeGift’s three regional 2nd Chance 5k virtual walk/runs. • Continued hosting donor family focus groups featuring participants from all three regions and from various donation timeframes to ensure we’re gathering input from this key stakeholder group. • Expanded Pathlight digital newsletter into a rich resource for our donor families. • Produced a virtual 2020 donor medal ceremony featuring closed captioning and Spanish translation options with our December 2021 donor medal ceremony planning currently underway working with a videographer.

Dagmar Climo, Director of Communications

Victoria Dhindsa, MHA, Public Education Coordinator II

Session Summary

Wear your walking shoes! This is a hands-on workshop that will have you learning and using Lean tools to take back and immediately implement in your organizations. Lean thinking challenges us as industry leaders to continuously improve our organizations by identifying and eliminating wastes, optimizing our resources, and engaging our employees. All with the end goal of providing value and support to our mission’s. Lean is a proven business philosophy that combines customer requirements (mission) with data-driven decision making, and employee engagement to create a culture of “kaizen” or continuous improvement. In this part 1 of 2 session, we will get a crash course in Lean thinking and principles and then facilitate you to complete 5 hands-on Lean tools.

Learning Objectives

1. Understand your organization’s best starting point by completing an Organizational Process Maturity Self-Assessment
2. Determine which projects have the biggest bang for your buck using a Project Prioritization Matrix
3. Use process maps to understand exactly where your resources are going and identify opportunities for streamlining
4. How to prevent a “Zombie Project” by scoping appropriately
5. Identify the 8 Deadly Wastes

Kathryn D. McIver, DBA, MBA, MBB, Founder

Session Summary

Part 2 of 2! This session is a continuation of LEAN On Me, where we will finish up the 5 hands-on workshops. At the conclusion of this session, you will have completed 5 tools and have the materials to start using these tools in your workplace next week! Your session outcomes for this session are to complete the exercises you didn’t get to complete in LEAN On Me.

Learning Objectives

1. Understand your organization’s best starting point by completing an Organizational Process Maturity Self-Assessment
2. Determine which projects have the biggest bang for your buck using a Project Prioritization Matrix
3. Use process maps to understand exactly where your resources are going and identify opportunities for streamlining
4. How to prevent a “Zombie Project” by scoping appropriately
5. Identify the 8 Deadly Wastes

Kathryn D. McIver, DBA, MBA, MBB, Founder

Session Summary

In the ever evolving world of supply chain supply continuity challenges are what keeps business leaders awake at night. The current pandemic has brought on an entirely new set of challenges. This presentations will discuss these challenges and how to engage your supply chain to create stronger alliances that are key to your success.

Learning Objectives

1. Current extreme challenges straining the worldwide supply chain.
2. Key elements of alliance management.
3. How to identify weaknesses in your supply chain systems.
4. What it takes to set up successful supply chain.

Uzair Rajput, MS, Chief Operating Officer, Lean Six Sigma Black Belt, MS Mechanical Engineering

"Authorization rate - it's the thing on everyone's minds. It's the elusive, slippery metric that is challenging to understand and even more difficult to increase long-term. As we have more and more data at our fingertips, we are starting to understand WHAT is happening with our metrics but are still struggling to understand WHY these things are happening.

How are we measuring success in our donation conversations? What does success look like anyway? Join us as we question how we're using available data, defining success, and attaining positive change for the long haul."

Sonja Barlow, BS, CTBS, Director of Training and Development