Observations On The Post-Mortem Tissue Donation Process For Biospecimen Research

October 19, 2017 | Sarah Gray of the American Association of Tissue Banks is featured on this podcast from Cambridge Healthtech Institute in preparation for the Leaders in Biobanking Congress. Topics include expectations about the process of donating post-mortem tissue for biospecimen research, possible process improvements to better serve patients, and connecting researchers with donor families to build biobank credibility and enable public support of biospecimen donation for biomedical research. Podcast

Here is a sample of the conversation that takes place:

CHI: The ultimate goal of biobankers and scientists in this community is, of course, to advance medicine and benefit patients. You could say the patients are the ultimate customers of all they do. Has there been anything you've observed or learned about the path from biospecimen management to biomedical research to translation to the clinic that could be improved to better serve the patients?

Sarah Gray: That seems like a really big step. I guess I'm thinking a bit more from a baby step perspective, which would be ... I think there was a step in the biospecimen path that could be improved. And it's the step between the donor family donating the tissue, giving it to, sometimes it's like an intermediary organization like NDRI, National Disease Research Interchange, or IIAM, the International Institute for the Advancement of Medicine, or a group like that that essentially takes the tissue and warehouses it or saves it and matches it with the researcher.