In a week where the medical community is up in arms about the new mammogram guidelines, the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG) announced women should get their first Pap test at age 21, regardless if they are sexually active before then. The ACOG said unnecessary treatment for a rare cancer can happen when ...

ADVANCE is sad to report that Teresa Marie Beiser, 36, of Gladstone, OR, was fatally shot at her workplace, Legacy MetroLab in Tualatin, OR, yesterday. Beiser was reportedly shot by her estranged husband, Robert James Beiser, 39, who later died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Two of Beiser's coworkers, a 20-year-old woman and a 63-year-old ...

Each year, my friends and family ask me if I will be taking the flu shot. Of course they are usually referring to the seasonal flu vaccine. This year, the situation is complicated by the appearance of the H1N1 or so called ''swine flu.'' I always advise questioners that one cannot get the flu from the flu shot, members of all high risk ...

Just over 2 months ago I wrote a blog discussing the NCA-ASCP merger. The blog elicited a lot of responses both directly on this site and through personal email. One nagging question has been the role of AMT in all of this. Some AMT certificants worried that they would become the forgotten step children. Would employers even start specifying ...

The FDA has approved four vaccines against the 2009 H1N1 influenza virus. The vaccines will be distributed nationally after the initial lots become available, which is expected within the next 4 weeks. All four firms manufacturing the H1N1 vaccines--CSL Limited, MedImmune LLC, Novartis Vaccines and Diagnostics Limited, and sanofi pasteur Inc., ...

Earlier today, Merck & Co. Inc announced the FDA's Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee recommended approving GARDASIL for males. The committee agreed efficacy, immunogenicity and safety data from clinical trials in males support the use of GARDASIL in boys and men ages 9 through 26 for preventing  genital warts ...

ADVANCE received the following press release from ASCLS: ''The Clinical Laboratory Coalition, of which ASCLS is a member, has written the Senate Finance Committee after learning a 20 percent Medicare laboratory co-pay was being proposed by the Senate Finance Committee.  The organization told the Committee Chair that: the ...

This morning I read a story in the New York Times about how New York is mandating flu shots for all healthcare workers, mostly out of fear of H1N1 outbreaks. A healthcare union in the state is protesting, saying: ''Healthcare workers on the front lines of providing care deserve the dignity and respect of thoughtful consideration before a ...

Here's a great article from The New York Times featuring the lab and H1N1 testing. The story says rapid tests for H1N1 fail to properly detect infections more than half the time. Have you been finding this is true for your laboratory?

 Just in: The two largest national certification agency for clinical laboratorians announced in Chicago that they have merged  (finally!)  Laboratorians have long recognized that one of the factors contributing to low recognition and confusion in the profession is the myriad of certification agencies. Our credentials are a ...