Dr. Collins serves as a forensic pathologist with Newberry Pathology Associates and is a Medical Director for SharingHope SC, the Organ and Tissue Donation Services for South Carolina. After receiving her BS in microbiology, magna cum laude Phi Beta Kappa, from the University of Georgia, Athens, Dr. Collins earned her MD from the Medical College of Georgia, Augusta. Following medical school, Dr. Collins completed an anatomic and clinical pathology residency at Wake Forest University/Bowman Gray School of Medicine. After residency, she completed a forensic fellowship at the Medical University of South Carolina where she remained on faculty as a Professor of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine, Director of Forensic and Autopsy Pathology, and Chief Medical Examiner. Dr. Collins is a Diplomat of the American Board of Pathology, board-certified in anatomic pathology, clinical pathology, and forensic pathology. She is a member of the College of American Pathologists and past Chair of the Autopsy Committee. She is past President of the South Carolina Society of Pathologists, and past Chair for the Pathology/Biology Section of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. She serves on the Board of Directors and is past-President for the National Association of Medical Examiners.

Emily L. Carter, CTBS, CEBT, is the Senior Account Manager for Donor Services at LeMaitre, Inc. Based in Salem, Massachusetts, she has steadily advanced her career in tissue recovery since 2015. Emily is an active member of the AATB community, contributing to the AATB RADE council and Education Committee, with a focus on providing diverse educational resources. Her current role spans the nation, where she oversees cardiovascular field training, tissue partner webinars, and serves as a vital link between tissue leaders and recovery teams. With a diverse medical background, Emily excels in communication with all stakeholders in the organ, eye and tissue donation industry.

Stefan Bernal is the Manager of National Recovery Network at LifeNet Health - he joined the team in 2018. Since his onboarding, his focus has been fostering healthy relationships with organizations and their front-line staff all throughout the United States. He has been an advocate for the highest standards and quality that LifeNet Health represents. Prior to LifeNet Health, Stefan worked at Nevada Donor Network, where he served as the Clinical Training and Development Coordinator. He is proudly from the Midwest, specifically a small town called Peru, Illinois. Stefan received his Certified Tissue Banking Specialist (CTBS) certification in 2016. He genuinely wants to change the world. Lastly, he likes long walks on the beach and gets frustrated writing his own bio.

Anna McDonald, M.D. - Medical Director Birth Tissue Recovery, LLC Winston-Salem, North Carolina Dr. McDonald completed her medical degree at Duke University Medical School prior to her training at Harvard-affiliated Massachusetts General Hospital (Anatomic and Clinical Pathology residency), Harvard-affiliated Boston Children's Hospital (Pediatric Pathology fellowship), and the Boston Office of the Chief Medical Examiner (Forensic Pathology fellowship). She served as a staff Pediatric Pathologist at Boston Children's Hospital and a Medical Examiner for the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. In 2014, she joined the Wake Forest Department of Pathology as an Assistant Professor of Pathology with specialty interests in forensic/autopsy pathology and perinatal/placental pathology. She was appointed as Medical Examiner for the State of North Carolina since 2014. She joined Birth Tissue Recovery, LLC as Medical Director in 2016, allowing her to integrate her expertise in placental/perinatal pathology and tissue and organ donor service experience. She is certified by the American Board of Pathology in Forensic Pathology, Pediatric Pathology, and Anatomic and Clinical Pathology.

As Exsurco’s leader of their Amalgatome devices, Codi helps burn clinicians solve challenges in excision and skin grafting.  Codi is available to assist surgical and burn centers in clinical evaluations, data collection, training labs and to provide support during burn and trauma procedures.

Codi has performed over 2,000 tissue recovery procedures resulting in life-saving allografts used in burn and trauma, cardiac and vascular applications.  He is sitting for the Certified Wound Care Specialist (CWS) this summer, adding that certification to his credentials. 

Adam helps maximize clinician experience with the Exsurco’s burn and surgical applications.  He leads training labs for our customers, conducts in-services, attends initial cases, assists in clinical evaluations of the system, works closely with Sterile Processing Departments and compiles documentation to support Value Analysis requirements. 

Adam has recovered over 16,000 life-saving skin allografts in his 11+ years as a Certified Tissue Banking Specialist (CTBS).  He plans to add Certified Wound Care Specialist (CWS) to his credentials soon.

Ryan’s passion is for training customers to ensure Exsurco products and services add value to the work they do every day.  In this role, he provides hands-on training programs, conducting in-services, providing product troubleshooting support regarding safety, handling, operation, and maintenance of the products in tissue banks.

Ryan understands the value of fostering a team approach to recovery based on his 14 years of experience in the Tissue Banking industry.  His guidance helps significantly increase split-thickness skin recovery yields at every site visited.

With Exsurco since its inception in 2010, Amber led the company’s growth into tissue and surgical settings to redefine excision science.  She supports Exsurco’s community of healthcare professional customers who are advancing the healing power of skin to patients who need it the most.

Uncovering customer needs, problem-solving, and providing solutions is nothing new to Amber who started her career as a Surgical Technician and Combat Medic in the U.S. Army.  After completing active duty, she remained in the reserves and found her home in the transplant industry at Lifeline of Ohio.  Her second day on the job was the September 11^th attacks on our nation and Amber knew then saving lives would become her lifelong passion.

Amber worked with the team of engineers that developed the Amalgatome MD for skin grafting procedures in tissue donation, which since 2010 has resulted in over half a million life-saving dermal allografts for burn survivors.

Exsurco is proud to be a partner of the Phoenix Society and The Spiegel Burn Foundation for Burn Survivors and an advocate for Tissue Donation Across America through Donate Life America and the American Association of Tissue Banks.

John is a Regulatory Affairs Specialist II at StimLabs, LLC. John has a bachelor’s degree in microbiology from Auburn University and a Master’s Degree in Regulatory Affairs from the University of Georgia. John is an expert in the regulation of both HCT/Ps and medical devices, including Quality System regulations, submissions, registration and licensure.

Jami Otis joined AlloSource in May 2007.  She brings over 22 years of experience in the healthcare industry, with 15 years focusing on training/education.  Jami received her education from the University of Colorado Boulder in Molecular, Cellular, and Developmental Biology.  Prior to joining AlloSource, Jami spent 13 years in the blood banking/cord blood industry, has experience in tissue recovery, and was an EMT-Intermediate for a rural ambulance service. Jami is currently the Donor Records Training Manager and runs the AlloSource Placenta Donation Program.

While serving as an enlisted aircrew member in the Air Force, Drew became interested in health care after flying a medical evacuation mission. Once he left the military, this interest intensified while his wife was dealing with health issues which led to the decision to attend nursing school. After graduation, Drew went to work in a surgical intensive care unit. While there, he volunteered to work as the bedside nurse for organ donation cases. Eventually, he was offered a job as an organ recovery coordinator with the Louisiana Organ Procurement Agency. In 1999 Drew moved to Dallas, where he began working at Transplant Services Center at UT Southwestern Medical Center. Drew is the Tissue Donation Screening & Education Supervisor with oversight of the Eye & Tissue Call Center as well as the Outreach group, which performs Hospital development and public education. 

Most biographies for speakers are full of credentials, awards, accomplishments, and other unexciting information. 

Let's say this for now: Everything in life is Powered By Connection. And Connection is Ginger's Jam. It's the art, science, and energy that makes the world go 'round. 

She works with great organizations, leaders and teams to do their best work by tapping into the incredible possibilities meaningful connections create, especially At The Table.

If you want to learn more about her, she invites you to visit gingerjohson.com. If you're really curious, you'll likely Google her anyway, finding her book, TEDx talk, events and program, YouTube channel and various sundry other information - all promotion and reaching purposeful human connection. 

For now, she thanks you for your time and attention. Pull up a chair and let's get to it!

A founding member of the Education Team at Infinite Legacy in 2019, Kai brings his expertise in teaching, material development, and facilitation to HR. As a trans man and member of the LGBTQIA+ community, Kai’s work centers on what it means to be included and how to reflect that in company culture from the onboarding of new team members, to tenured staff and leadership.

His credentials include the following:

18 Years of teaching experience as a karate instructor, English as a second language teacher, and a language tutor for students studying English or Japanese
BA: Asian Studies
MA: Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages (TESOL)
Certifications: TESOL, Instructional Design, DEI, JLPT 4

 
Kai enjoys keeping active. When he isn’t spending time with his family, he enjoys playing video games, doing art of many kinds, studying foreign languages, and preparing for performances with his belly dance troupe.

Dr. Jim Caruso is the Chief Medical Examiner and Coroner for the City and County of Denver.  He received his undergraduate and medical training at the University of Illinois and completed a Pathology residency and a fellowship in Diving and Hyperbaric Medicine at Duke University Medical Center.  Dr. Caruso subsequently completed a Forensic Pathology fellowship at the Office of the Maryland Medical Examiner in Baltimore.  He then served as Deputy Chief Medical Examiner for the Armed Forces and Regional Armed Forces Medical Examiner for Asia and the Pacific.  Memorable cases include the investigation of the Space Shuttle Columbia mishap and the autopsy of former professional football player Pat Tillman.  Captain Caruso spent nearly 30-years in the United States Navy during which time he served as both a Diving Medical Officer and a Flight Surgeon.  He has published numerous scientific abstracts, peer-reviewed papers, and book chapters in the areas of forensic pathology and diving medicine.  Dr. Caruso resides with his wife Pamela in Castle Rock, CO and has a daughter at Colorado State University and another at the University of Colorado.

Dr. Margaret Warner is an injury epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics, Division of Vital Statistics, Mortality Statistics Branch. Her research focuses on fatal drug overdose, suicide, and other sudden death. She speaks, publishes, and consults on the analysis and interpretation of health data, especially vital statistics mortality data. As part of her work on surveillance, Dr. Warner is coordinating and promoting public health surveillance efforts in the offices of medical examiners, coroners, and forensic toxicologists to improve quality, timeliness, and consistency of drug overdose data. Dr. Warner received her doctorate from the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health and studied injury epidemiology on a Fulbright Fellowship at the University of Otago in New Zealand.

Josh Brennan spent six years as an EMS professional and was an educator for the Red Cross. Josh has been with New England Donor Services since 2008 in various roles in the Tissue Operations Department. He is currently the Director of Tissue Operations. He has published three abstract articles with the American Association of Tissue Banks and was part of the creative development team for the Hopes Heroes - Donor Family Program. He has been invited to speak at multiple workshops/conferences/webinars on various topics, including Electronic Tissue Authorization, Call Center Scheduling, Algorithmic Tissue Screening, Electronic Tissue Allocation, DRAI competency & training, and Grief Concepts. Josh is currently the Chair of the AATB Education Committee and was the project co-manager on the development of the Sepsis Education Online Learning Tool for the RADE Council.