october

6 | General NewsACB Medal Award 2014Eric KilpatrickThe ACB Medal Award has showcased thetalent of ACB Members in training since 1971.Traditionally, the Award is made on the basisof an oral communication at the Association’sAnnual National Meeting, Focus, but in yearswhere the ACB has been hosting internationalmeetings instead of Focus the Award has notbeen held. With EuroLabFocus being inLiverpool, this should have been an occasionwhen the Award skipped a year. However, theACB was keen to ensure that this importantevent still went ahead and so the SouthernRegion kindly agreed to host the session aspart of their regional meeting on the 5thSeptember, which also included an update onliver pathology and diagnosis.Quality Work of Direct Clinical RelevanceFour abstracts were shortlisted forpresentation and I had the privilege ofchairing the session and being one of the fourjudges. There was an eclectic mix of topicswhich started with Oliver Clifford-Mobleydiscussing an assay which could simultaneouslymeasure urinary metabolites relevant toprimary hyperoxaluria. This was followed byAngie Cooper describing how she had usedzinc transporter 8 autoantibodies to helpdiscriminate MODY from type 1 diabetes inyoung, newly diagnosed patients. KatieHadfield then told us how she had usedlaboratory data to markedly improve thedetection and documentation rates of chronickidney disease within primary care. Last topresent was Rachel Curd, who discussed howshe had developed a rapid mass spectrometryscreening test to exclude galactosaemia.The quality of the work and the way inwhich it was presented by each person wasexcellent, which made the task of the judgesextremely difficult. All four would have beenworthy winners, but it was Angie Cooper whoreceived the Award and Oliver Clifford-Mobleywho was runner-up.I was pleased that in a non-Focus year thecream of young talent in our specialities stillgot the opportunity to show us just howaccomplished they are. For those of us whoworry about the future for laboratorymedicine, the ACB Medal. ■Rachel Curd, Katie Hadfield, Oliver Clifford-Mobley and Angie Cooper presented at this year’s ACB MedalACB News | Issue 618 | October 2014