ICSH

INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL FOR STANDARDIZATION IN HAEMATOLOGY

ICSH Board Meeting Marriott Hotel, New Orleans, LA, USA

Napoleon room (41st floor)

Thursday 5th May 2011, 1-4pm 1. Welcome/Apologies. Attendance list with email addresses is located at the end of these meeting

minutes. 2. Minutes of October 2010 – Corrections to the minutes, minor changes – S. McFadden to update those

minutes and email to all. 3. Review of Published Projects – Four articles submitted in the last 12 months. To date, all articles

completed were submitted to IJLH, who fast track the submission process for us. a. Four articles submitted in the last 12 months. To date, all articles completed were submitted to

IJLH, who fast track the submission process for us. • ESR – Chair Dr. Jou – Published • HGB A2 and also HGB F – Submitted April 13, in the review process, which is being

expedited. • Schistocytes – G. Zini will conduct discussions with the co-authors regarding the final

recommendations. Paper will be updated with that information. b. IJLH article submission process– Current process: When an article is accepted for publication, a

signature of all authors must be obtained. IJLH will be changing the process so that the signature is received at the beginning of the process so that all co-authors will have agreed to content before the publication process begins.

c. All ICSH papers musts must be submitted to the ICSH Board prior to submission to IJLH. d. S. Kitchen will discuss the final submission guidelines with S. Machin when finalized.

4. Ongoing Projects a. Extended Differential Reference Method – B. Woods – Comparison of 3 methods. Draft paper

submitted recently for review. M. Rousell is writing paper. The final paper is scheduled to be sent for ICSH review around Sept 1. This will be a recommendation, not the final standards, as the project will continue. Will follow up at the autumn meeting.

b. Evaluation of Automated Haematology Analyzers – C. Briggs – Project will be delayed until the

first recommendation on the Extended Differential are ready, so that it can be incorporated. Will need for B. Wood or M. Rousell to write the method for inclusion in this program. B. Davis to provide the most recent CLSI document. Working group includes C. Briggs, G. Zini, N. Culp, J. Jou, Y. Kawai and B. Woods and industry nominated persons.

c. Standardization of Cell Morphology Grading – S. McFadden – Morphology Workshop will be

held Monday May 9. All except two panel members will be present, either in person or on the phone. Estimate producing a paper during 2012.

d. Validation of Cell Based Assays – B. Davis – Meeting in March 2011 in Maine. The meeting was

supported by 10 companies (including pharma, reference labs etc), and also underwritten by

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Clinical Cytometry Society. There will be a summary presentation at the ICSH session of ISLH meeting this year. Timeline: draft for board review at the autumn meeting.

e. Sample Stability – R. Simon – Final draft paper in process and circulated to co-authors. Further work needed is statistical analysis (standard deviation for the difference in the counts). Will submit to the ICSH Board in September for comment. C. Briggs will then send to external reviewers for further comment. An issue was raised that the study did not include stains used in North America. R. Simon will conduct a small study in the US/NAO using a different stain. T. George will review the paper as an independent reviewer.

f. MPV Standardization – S. Machin is trying to obtain calibrated beads to run through all of the

analyzers. Will give an update at the autumn meeting.

g. Bone Marrow Immunohistochemistry– E. Torlakovic will be presenting the panel findings at the ICSH session of this year’s ISLH meeting. The next step will be to plan for panel group meeting by September to discuss the standardization challenges. This panel is looking for meeting sponsors. Contact the treasurer regarding funding.

5. WBC Differential Reporting – D. Zwick Request to have ICSH to endorse the reporting of WBC differential in absolute terms only, thus dropping the cell type percentage. This issue keeps coming up and direction is needed and requested from ICSH. Suggestion made to bring this proposal into the overall harmonization project. T. George stated that CMS views the differential cell types expressed as percentages as the regulated analytes, not the absolute parameters. This may be true in other countries.

6. Potential New Projects Presented/Provisionally Agreed in Maine 2010

a. PNH – B. Davis - Tabled until after Autumn Meeting b. Automation of Body Fluid Cell Counts – G. Bourner. Presented the project need and scope.

Working Panel will include A. Huismann, T. George, J. Han, Y. Kawai, and a customer from France (Horiba Medical will help to find). Update at Autumn meeting.

c. Standardization of Test Performance Based on Clinical Need – A. Beshiri – Unable to attend this meeting. Secretary to write to request an update

d. Standardization of Haematology Reporting Units – J. Jou, K. Hyde – This project will now incorporate the WBC Differential Reporting. Panel members include G. Bourner, (Dr. Kawai will recommend another Japanese doctor), Jin-han, (Szu-Hee will look for an Australian)

7. New Proposals a. A. Stephens – Assessment of automated equipment for the measurement of HGB A2. Project will

be presented at the Autumn meeting. b. M. Proytcheva – This proposal is for the standardization of Pathology Review for peripheral

blood smear interpretation. This would include pathology review criteria, standardization of what should be reported to the physicians (what is relevant). Project will be presented at the Autumn meeting

8. Autumn 2011 Meeting – CONFIRMATION OF MEETING DATE AND LOCATION

Meeting November 17, 18, 2011Montpellier, France at the Crown Plaza – Details to follow in a separate email in September.

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9. Spring 2012 Meeting – ISLH meeting will be in Nice, France, May 21-24, 2011. We would have a session (General Assembly) at ISLH for presentations (3-4). Their meeting runs Monday through Wednesday. ICSH is investigating where and when to hold our Spring - Details to follow.

10. Financial Report – B. Davis – ICSH Treasury is healthy. No issues at this time. 11. Association with other organizations - S. Machin

a. ISLH Relationship between the two societies will continue as is. b. ISH – There is a possibility of participating in their meeting in Cancun, Mexico. We are waiting

to hear back from their meeting organizers/ISH Chairs. c. CLSI – ? d. JCTLM – Three proposals are in review, one is in conflict with the 1992 ICSH blood collection

standard. H. Hoffman will investigate this and give us an update. The other two proposals (reference methods) are not in conflict with ICSH standards, however, H. Hoffman will check on this to make sure.

e. WHO – Report given by K. Hyde to attendees. Electronic copy will be sent to the secretary. WHO is kept informed of ICSH activities, including all panels and publications. R. Simon to attend the next WHO meeting.

f. JSLH –Poster 208 at this meeting. g. ICCS – Continues to work with ICSH on various projects. B. Woods will be the ICCS

representative to ICSH. h. CAP – T. George stated that it would be good to have a relationship with CAP. i. IFCC – Discussion of the activities of this organization, including their overlap into the

Hematology Laboratory practices in parts of Europe. This may be an agenda item for the autumn meeting.

12. ICSH Officers – Discussion of the term of office for the Board, which is up in 2012. Concern

expressed about overlap and integration of new officers. The officers will meet to discuss a smooth transition plan and will present this at the autumn 2011 meeting.

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