NEWS & EVENTS
Sickle Cell In Focus Conference 2018 Logo

Sickle Cell in Focus Conference 2018

October 22 - 23, 2018
Natcher Conference Center, Ruth L. Kirschstein Auditorium
45 Center Dr., NIH, Bethesda, MD 20894

Description

After an exciting event in Kingston, Jamaica in October 2017, we are thrilled to announce that the 12th annual Sickle Cell in Focus (SCiF) conference will return to the National Institutes of Health (NIH) on October 22-23, 2018.

SCiF is a two-day, intensive, educational update on sickle cell disease. This year’s conference will focus on management of the older adult patients, curative therapies, systems medicine, and will also include 2 debates on issues for which there are no clear answers.

This comprehensive and global exploration of the current medical trends and research results in sickle cell disease and thalassemia is geared towards consultants, trainees, doctors, healthcare professionals, and academics interested in hemoglobin disorders.

Watch Live:

October 22: https://videocast.nih.gov/live.asp?live=28814

October 23: https://videocast.nih.gov/live.asp?live=28818

 

To view the complete Event Program click here.

For inquiries regarding CE credits, please contact SCiFConference@nhlbi.nih.gov

Agenda

8:00am
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Registration

9:00am
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Opening Remarks

Richard Childs
Clinical Director, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute

9:05am - 10:05am
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SESSION ONE: Sickle Cell Disease in 2018

Chairs: Vence Bonham / Jennifer Knight-Madden

9:05am - From birth to adults, has survival improved?
Kathryn Hassell
University of Colorado School of Medicine, Aurora, CO, USA

Optimizing current approved therapies

9:35am - Implementation research: Improving coverage of patients taking HU
Keith Hoots
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

10:05am - Translating Clinical Care to Developing Countries
Russell Ware
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medicine Center, Cincinnati, OH, USA

10:35am
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BREAK

10:45am - 11:45am
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SESSION TWO: SCD in Adults

Chairs: Oswaldo Castro / Laura de Castro

10:45am - Optimal disease management & health monitoring in older adults
Sophie Lanzkron
John Hopkins Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

11:15am - How we manage VTE’s in adults
Theodore Wun
UC Davis Comprehensive Cancer Center, Sacramento, CA, USA

11:45am - Understanding pain and its mechanisms
Catherine Bushnell
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

12:15pm
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LUNCH

1:15pm - 1:45pm
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SESSION TWO: SCD in Adults (cont.)

Chairs: Oswaldo Castro / Laura de Castro

1:15pm - The many facets of sickle pain and its management
Samir Ballas
Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, PA

1:45pm - Management of liver complications in SCD
Abid Suddle
King’s College Hospital NHS Foundation Trust, London, UK

2:15pm - 3:15pm
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SESSION THREE: Blood transfusion and iron overload

Chair: Patricia Shi

2:15pm - Presentation of the untransfusable patient
Arun Shet
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD

2:45pm - Genotyping vs extended phenotyping
Connie Westhoff
New York Blood Center, New York, NY, USA

3:15pm - Iron overload in SCD, are we making progress?
John Porter
University College Hospital, London, UK

3:45pm
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BREAK

4:00pm - 4:40pm
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DEBATE 1: Biomarkers in SCD: Just a lot of noise and handwaving

Chair: Patricia Oneal

4:00pm - Pro: David Rees
King’s College London, London, UK

4:20pm - Con: Marilyn Telen
Duke School of Medicine, Durham, NC, USA

4:40pm - Debate

5:00pm
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DAY ONE CLOSE

7:30am
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Registration

8:30am
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Opening Remarks

Gary H. Gibbons
Director, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, Bethesda, MD, USA

8:35am - 10:05am
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SESSION FOUR: Unanswered questions and new frontiers in curative therapies

Chair: Allistair Abraham

8:35am - Allo-HSCT: match related, match unrelated, cord blood, and haplo
Mark Walters
Children's Hospital Oakland Research Institute, Oakland, CA

9:05am - Collecting HSCs, not a trivial business
John Tisdale
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

9:35am - Gene therapy-addition, correction
Dan Bauer
Boston Children’s Hospital, Boston, MA, USA

10:05am - Update on gene addition therapy in SCD
Alexis Thompson
Northwestern University, Chicago, IL, USA

10:35am
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BREAK

10:45am - 11:45am
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SESSION FIVE: Cerebrovascular disease in SCD

Chair: Eboni Lance

10:45am - Cerebrovascular disease in SCD: In Children
Lori Jordan
Vanderbilt University Medical Center, Nashville, TN, USA

11:15am - Neurocognitive outcomes in SCD
Allison King
Washington University in St. Louis, St. Louis, MO, USA

11:45am - Cerebral Hemodynamics in sickle cell disease and sickle cell carriers
Monica Hulbert
St. Louis Children’s Hospital, St. Louis, MO, USA

12:15pm
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LUNCH

1:15pm - 1:45pm
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SESSION SIX: Inflammation and vascular injury in SCD

Chair: Hans Ackerman

1:15pm - The common ground between SCD and Malaria
Tom Williams
KEMRI/Wellcome Trust Research Programme, Kilifi, Kenya

1:45pm - Elevated inflammatory markers - Do they mean anything in sickle pathophysiology?
Nicola Conran
University of Campinas, Sao Paulo, Brazil

2:15pm - 3:15pm
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SESSION SEVEN: System medicine and Big Data: Transforming care of SCD to the 21st century

Chair: Suvanka Majumdar

2:15pm - Complex genetics for a simple mutation-getting to the heart of the matter
Swee Lay Thein
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

2:45pm - A short cut to modeling SCD
George Karniadakis
Brown University, Providence, RI, USA

3:15pm - Machine Learning to predict cardiovascular phenotypes of SCD
Vandana Sachdev
National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA

3:45pm
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BREAK

4:00pm - 4:40pm
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DEBATE 2: Developing therapies for SCD - Makes more sense to target the root cause than all the downstream events

Chair: Robert Nickel

4:00pm - Pro: Yogen Saunthararajah
Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, OH, USA

4:20pm - Con: Jane Little
UH Cleveland Medical Center, Cleveland, OH, USA

4:40pm - Debate

5:00pm
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CLOSE OF CONFERENCE

Select Speakers

Photo of Dr. Rick Childs
National Heart Lung and Blood Institute, National Institutes of Health
Rear Admiral (RADM) Richard Childs serves as the Clinical Director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH). He graduated from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., and Georgetown University Medical School.
Richard Childs, M.D.
Photo of Kathryn Hassell
University of Colorado Denver
Dr. Kathryn Hassell is a Professor of Medicine and Director of the Colorado Sickle Cell Center and inpatient and outpatient pharmacy-directed anticoagulation services at the University of Colorado Denver.
Kathryn Hassell, M.D.
Photo of Keith Hoots
National Institutes of Health
W. Keith Hoots, M.D., is director of NHLBI’s Division of Blood Diseases and Resources. Dr. Hoots received his A.B. in English and chemistry and his M.D. from the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
W. Keith Hoots, M.D.
Photo of Russell Ware
University of Cincinnati
Russell Ware, MD, is the Director of the Global Health Center and Director of the Division of Hematology at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital in Cincinnati, as well as a tenured Professor of Pediatrics and Endowed Chair of Hematology Translational Research at the University of Cincinnati.
Russell Ware, M.D.
Photo of Sophie Lanzkron
Johns Hopkins School of Medicine
Dr. Lanzkron is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Oncology in the Division of Hematology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and is the Director of the Sickle Cell Center for Adults at Johns Hopkins which delivers state-of-the art, multidisciplinary care to over 500 patients.
Sophie Lanzkron, M.D., MHS
Photo of Ted Wun
UC Davis School of Medicine
Ted Wun, M.D., is Associate Dean for Research, PI/Director of the UC Davis Clinical and Translations Science Center, and Chief, Division of Hematology Oncology at the UC Davis School of Medicine.
Ted Wun, M.D.
Photo of Catherine Bushnell
National Institutes of Health
Dr. Bushnell is the Scientific Director of the National Center for Complementary and Integrative Health at the NIH. She holds a Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from the American University and received postdoctoral training in neurophysiology at the NIH.
M. Catherine Bushnell, Ph.D.
Photo of Samir Ballas
Thomas Jefferson University
Dr. Samir K. Ballas is board certified in Internal Medicine, Hematology, Transfusion Medicine/Blood Banking, Pain Medicine and Pain Management. He is an Emeritus Professor of medicine and Pediatrics at Thomas Jefferson University and Honorary staff member of the Hematology Institute in Brazil.
Samir Ballas, M.D.
Photo of Abid Suddle
King’s College Hospital
Consultant, Hepatologist and Liver Transplant Physician at the Institute of Liver Studies, King's College Hospital, London, United Kingdom. Research and clinical interests include liver cancer, liver transplantation, and liver disease in patients with Sickle Cell Disease.
Abid Suddle
Photo of Arun Shet
National Institutes of Health
Dr. Shet is a Staff Clinician/Senior Research Physician in the Sickle Cell Branch/NHLBI, involved in patient care and translational research centering on adults with sickle cell disease. He’s the Principal Investigator on 2 active protocols and an Associate Investigator on 4 other active protocols.
Arun Shet, M.D.
Connie Westhoff
New York Blood Center
Dr. Westhoff is the executive scientific director of the Laboratory for Immunohematology and Genomics at the New York Blood Center and the National Center for Blood Group Genomics.
Connie Westhoff, Ph.D.
Photo of John Porter
University College London Hospitals
Dr. John Porter is a Professor of Haematology and Consultant Haematologist at the University College London Hospitals in London, UK and head of the joint Red Cell Unit for UCLH and Whittington Hospitals.
John Porter, M.A., M.D.
Photo of David Rees
King’s College Hospital
David Rees is a paediatric haematologist at King’s College Hospital, London. He trained in various places around the UK, including Bath and the Channel Island of Jersey. He is a medical adviser to the Sickle Cell Society in the UK.
David C. Rees, M.A.
Photo of Marilyn Telen
Duke University
Dr. Telen is the Wellcome Professor of Medicine at Duke University. Dr. Telen has focused both her research and clinical efforts on red cell membrane proteins, the antigens carried by them, and the disorders associated with abnormalities of red blood cells.
Marilyn Telen, M.D.
Photo of Dr. Gary Gibbons
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
Gary H. Gibbons, M.D., is Director of the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (NHLBI) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), where he oversees the third largest institute at the NIH.
Gary H. Gibbons, M.D.
Photo of Mark Walters
University of California, San Francisco
Mark C. Walters, MD, is the Jordan Family Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplantation Program at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital, Oakland and Professor of Pediatrics at UCSF. He is Program Director of the CIRM alpha stem cell clinic at UCSF.
Mark C. Walters, M.D.
Photo of John Tisdale
National Institutes of Health
John Tisdale received his M.D. degree from the Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, where he also received his B.A. in Chemistry. He is the Chief of the Cellular and Molecular Therapeutics Branch, NHLBI.
John Tisdale, M.D.
Photo of Daniel E. Bauer
Harvard Medical School
Dr. Bauer is Principal Investigator and Staff Physician at Dana-Farber/Boston Children’s Cancer and Blood Disorders Center, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, Principal Faculty at the Harvard Stem Cell Institute, and Associate Member of the Broad Institute of MIT & Harvard.
Daniel E. Bauer, M.D., Ph.D.
Photo of Alexis Thompson
Northwestern University School of Medicine
Dr. Thompson heads the Hematology Section, Division of Hematology Oncology Transplantation and Director of the Comprehensive Thalassemia Program at the Ann and Robert H. Lurie Children’s Hospital of Chicago, serve as A. Watson and Sarah Armour Endowed Chair for Childhood Cancer and Blood Disorders.
Alexis Thompson, M.D., MPH
Photo of Lori Jordan
Vanderbilt University Medical School
Lori Jordan, MD, PhD is an Associate Professor of Pediatrics and Neurology at Vanderbilt University Medical Center in Nashville, TN. She completed medical school at the University of Oklahoma and residency in Pediatrics and Child Neurology at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.
Lori Jordan, M.D., Ph.D.
Photo of Allison King
Washington University School of Medicine
Dr. Allison King is a pediatric and young adult hematologist investigating cognitive function and educational attainment of children and adults with sickle cell disease. She is an Associate Professor of Occupational Therapy at the Washington University School of Medicine.
Allison King, M.D., MPH, Ph.D.
Photo of Monica Hulbert
Washington University School of Medicine
Dr. Hulbert is the director of the Pediatric Sickle Cell Disease Program at St. Louis Children’s Hospital and an Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Washington University School of Medicine.
Monica L. Hulbert, M.D.
Photo of Tom Williams
Imperial College, London
Dr. Williams is a pediatrician and clinical investigator, working at the KEMRI/Wellcome Trust Research Programme (KWTRP) in Kilifi, Kenya since 2000, while holding parallel appointments at UK Universities. Professor Williams is the Chair of Hemoglobinopathy Research at Imperial College, London.
Tom Williams, M.D., Ph.D.
Photo of Nicola Conran
University of Campinas, Brazil
Dr. Conran is a Biochemist with a Ph.D. from the University of Nottingham, UK. She leads the Vascular Inflammation Laboratory at the Haematology and Haemotherapy Centre, University of Campinas where she investigates mechanisms of vaso-occlusion, inflammation and cell adhesion in sickle cell disease.
Nicola Conran, Ph.D.
Photo of Swee Lay Thein
National Institutes of Health
Dr. Thein is a hematologist and clinical investigator at the NIH. Dr. Thein joined the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute/NIH in spring 2015 as Senior Investigator and Chief of the Institute’s Sickle Cell Branch.
Swee Lay Thein, M.B.
Photo of George Karniadakis
George Karniadakis received his S.M. and Ph.D. from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is a Professor of Applied Mathematics in the Center for Fluid Mechanics at Brown University.
George Karniadakis, Ph.D.
Photo of Vandana Sachdev
National Institutes of Health
Vandana Sachdev is a cardiologist and Staff Clinician in the Cardiology Branch of the NHLBI Division of Intramural Research. She received her M.D. from the University of Michigan and trained in cardiology at the University of Maryland.
Vandana Sachdev, M.D.
Photo of Yogen Saunthararajah
Yogen Saunthararajah is a Professor of Medicine, Staff Physician and Co-Leader of the Developmental Therapeutics Program at the Taussig Cancer Institute of Cleveland Clinic and Case Comprehensive Cancer Center, and founding-scientist of EpiDestiny.
Yogen Saunthararajah, M.D.
Photo of Jane Little
Case Western Reserve School of Medicine
Jane Little M.D. is director of the Adult Sickle Cell program at University Hospitals/Seidman Cancer Center in Cleveland, Ohio. She is a Professor of Medicine at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.
Jane Little, M.D.