Ms. Sumaira Ahmed – The Sumaira Foundation (TSF)
Prior to her career in healthcare and hospital administration in Boston, Sumaira worked as an actor/model in Hindi-/Bengali-language media, primarily in southeast Asia. Sumaira is a classically trained Kathak dancer and has performed in prestigious venues including Madison Square Garden, the Kodak Theatre, Santiniketan, and the Rudolf Steiner Theatre.
In the summer of 2014, Sumaira was diagnosed with seronegative neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD) after experiencing sudden and severe vision loss and weakness/numbness. Less than two months after her diagnosis, she founded The Sumaira Foundation (TSF) dedicated to generating global awareness of NMOSD and MOGAD, building communities of support for patients and their caregivers, supporting research, and advocating on behalf of patients.
In 2015, Sumaira was crowned the 1st Miss Bangladesh-USA advocating for equal opportunity education for Bangladeshi children in efforts to increase tolerance and strengthen the country’s international presence, economy, and infrastructure.
In September 2021, Sumaira was honored with WEGO Health’s “Best Kept Secret” Award recognizing her advocacy work in rare disease.
In October 2021, Sumaira was featured in a Wall Street Journal article about Medicare’s drug-pricing debate.
In 2022, Sumaira was prominently featured in an Emmy Award-winning show, Medical Stories, on PBS. You can watch the full episode, NMO: Blindsided Within here: https://youtu.be/UoYri5CDftI
The Sumaira Foundation is recognized around the globe as one of the leading patient advocacy organizations focused on NMOSD & MOGAD with an international Medical Advisory Board, 60 patient & caregiver Ambassadors from 22 countries and active across 6 continents.
AMLI Erwin Neter Laureate Award of Lifetime Achievement
Every year the Association of Medical Laboratory Immunologists (AMLI) recognizes and honors an individual who has made significant contributions to the field of medical laboratory immunology. The AMLI Erwin Neter Laureate Award of Lifetime Achievement is awarded annually in honor of Dr. Erwin Neter who was an internationally known clinical microbiologist, immunologist and pediatrician. Dr. Neter was an outstanding leader and was instrumental in defining and recognizing the discipline of medical laboratory immunology.
AMLI Distinguished Service Award
Every year AMLI also recognizes and honors an individual who has performed who has provided an extraordinary amount of services to the organization. This year AMLI recognizes Sara Nandiwada for her work in organizing and implementing the Education Committee.
The Diplomate in Medical Laboratory Immunology (DMLI)
certification examination is complete and available!
You can find related information at www.ascp.oig/boc/dmli
This exam is the result of a lot of hard work by several colleagues and organizations. We want to acknowledge the American Society for Clinical Pathology (ASCP) Board of Certification (BOC) Board of Governors along with the BOC Executive Directors over the past few years – Pat Tanabe, MPA, MASCP, MLS(ASCP)CM and Amy Spiczka, MS, HTL(ASCP)CMSCT, MBCM, CPHQ, for their support and efforts. The BOC team worked long hours with the examination committee and on their own to build and publish the exam. The exam committee met in person and virtually for conference calls and question development. The committee consists of American Board of Medical Laboratory Diplomates (ABMLI) Drs. Anne Tebo, John Schmitz, Aaruni Khanolkar, Gerry Miller, Sarc Nandiwada, Tracey Bonfield and Tom Alexander. We are grateful for the support of many diagnostic companies and granting organizations who have contributed over $33,000 to date toward exam development. The committee appreciates Melissa Miller working with Peggy McNult at the American Society of Microbiology (ASM) to provide the ABMLI question bank which we used as a foundation for the development of the DMLI exam. Finally, we would like to acknowledge the ASM Committee of Postgraduate Educational Programs (CPEP) program directors, ABMLI Diplomates and Association of Medical Laboratory Immunologists (AMLI) members who have encouraged and supported this endeavor over the past six years.
2023 ANNUAL MEETING EXHIBITORS
Without our faithful vendors, this meeting would not be possible! Please send great thanks to them for their wonderful support of AMLI’s Annual Meeting.
Aesku
Binding Site
Bio-Rad Laboratories
Buhlmann Diagnostics
Eagle Biosciences
Euroimmun US
IBL-America
ImmunAware, Inc.
Immundiagnostik, Inc.
ImmunoConcepts
Kronus Inc.
KSL Diagnostics/Beutner Labs
National Jewish Health
Neurocode
Prometheus Laboratories
Scimedx
Sebia
Thermo Fisher Scientific
Viralab, Inc.
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