PATHOLOGY AND LABORATORY MEDICINE

Department Report

The Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at Nationwide Children’s Hospital provides a wide range of pediatric diagnostic services for hospitalized and ambulatory infants, children and adolescent patients. Laboratory services are provided through the main campus anatomic and clinical pathology laboratories, as well as multiple outpatient/reference laboratory testing facilities, Nationwide Children’s Close To HomeSM and Urgent Care centers, and our freestanding Emergency Department.

FACULTY

Shamlal Mangray, MB, BS

Chief, Pathology and Laboratory Medicine Section Chief, Anatomic Pathology

Kathleen K. Nicol, MD

Medical Director Section Chief, Clinical Pathology

Roshini Abraham, PhD Peter B. Baker III, MD Laura Biederman, MD Daniel R. Boue, MD, PhD Dustin Bunch, PhD Catherine Chung, MD Miriam R. Conces, MD Bonita R. Fung, MD Sophonie Jean, PhD Samir Kahwash, MD Selene Koo, MD, PhD Amy L. Leber, PhD Huifei Liu, MD, PhD Rachel Mariani, MD Erin K. Meyer, DO, MPH Jeffery Papiernik, MD Christopher R. Pierson, MD, PhD Vinay Prasad, MD Amy L. Pyle-Eilola, PhD Nilsa Del Carmen Ramirez-Milan, MD Archana Shenoy, MD Diana Thomas, MD Huanyu Wang, PhD

AFFILIATED FACULTY Biochemical Genetics

Dennis W. Bartholomew, MD Kim L. McBride, MD, MS

Steve and Cindy Rasmussen Institute for Genomic Medicine Clinical Laboratory

Catherine Cottrell, PhD Jesse Hunter, PhD Kristy Lee, PhD Marco Leung, PhD Mariam Mathew, PhD Ruthann B. Pfau, PhD Shalini C. Reshmi, PhD Matthew Schultz, PhD

Neuromuscular Pathology Zarife Sahenk, MD, PhD

The department includes more than 25 pathologists and doctoral scientists with subspecialty expertise in pediatric pathology and laboratory medicine. This professional staff is supported by more than 400 technical staff who provide 24/7 coverage in critical patient care areas. As an integral part of Nationwide Children’s operations, our team provides specimen collection and diagnostic services in multiple service centers across Ohio.

In the last year, the Anatomic Pathology Laboratory processed close to 10,000 surgical cases, 1,300 cytology specimens and 90 autopsies. Clinical laboratories performed more than 3.1 million tests in various subspecialty areas. As part of our core mission, we were actively involved in undergraduate and graduate medical education, and our faculty served in multiple leadership roles locally and on the national scene. Faculty highlights include the appointment of Shamlal Mangray, MB, BS, as chief of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine; Kathy Nicol, MD, as medical director; Miriam Conces, MD, as director of surgical pathology; and Selene Koo, MD, PhD, as director of autopsy pathology. Additionally, two anatomic pathologists and three molecular pathologists were recruited in the last year.

Dustin Bunch, PhD, who joined our team as assistant director of clinical chemistry, is also assistant director of laboratory informatics. Dr. Bunch has made enormous contributions to our laboratory informatics initiatives and coordinated efforts between the laboratory and Nationwide Children’s Clinical Informatics teams in the short time he has been here.

Most recently, Amy Leber, PhD, Huanyu Wang, PhD, and Sophonie Jean, PhD, worked feverishly with their microbiology team to make Nationwide Children’s the first hospital in central Ohio to go live with COVID-19 polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing. In addition, they helped other institutions with trouble-shooting to get testing online. This team also brought on COVID-19 antibody testing. Kathy Nicol, MD, and Roshini Abraham, PhD, coordinated with our clinical team for the administration of convalescent plasma as part of the treatment regimen for one of our patients. Jade Wilson MBA, MT (ASCP), has worked closely with leaders in epidemiology and administration to support the Nationwide Children’s response to the pandemic.

Many of our faculty serve in professional committees at the level including leadership roles. Nilsa Ramirez, MD, director of the Biopathology Center, was the recipient of the College of American Pathologists Lifetime Achievement Award for 2019, and Roshini Abraham, PhD, director of Diagnostic Immunology Laboratory, was the recipient of the Carl R. Jolliff Award for Lifetime Achievement in Clinical or Diagnostic Immunology.

GRANTS AWARDED JULY 1, 2019– JUNE 30, 2020

$1,185,529

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Conces MR, Hughes A, Pierson CR. Neuropathology of Mowat-Wilson Syndrome. Pediatric and Developmental Pathology. 2020;23(4):322-325.

Liu H, Guinipero TL, Schieffer KM, et al. De novo Primary Central Nervous System Pure Erythroid Leukemia/Sarcoma with t(1;16)(p31;q24) NFIA/CBFA2T3 Translocation. Haematologica. 2020;105(4):e194-e197.

Miller CR, Lee K, Pfau RB, Reshmi SC, Corsmeier DJ, Hashimoto S, Dave-Wala A, Jayaraman V, Koboldt D, Matthews T, Mouhlas D, Stein M, McKinney A, Grossman T, Kelly BJ, White P, Magrini V, Wilson RK, Mardis ER, Cottrell CE. High Frequency of Disease-Associated Mosaic Variation in Clinical Exome Sequencing: A Two-Year Pediatric Tertiary Care Cohort Experience. Cold Spring Harbor Molecular Case Studies. 2020 Jun 12;6(3):a005231.

Sacco KA, Smith MJ, Bahna SL, Buchbinder D, Burkhardt J, Cooper MA, Hartog NL, Kobrynski L, Patel KP, Abraham RS. NAPDH Oxidase-Specific Flow Cytometry Allows for Rapid Genetic Triage and Classification of Novel Variants in Chronic Granulomatous Disease. The Journal of Clinical Immunology. 2020 Jan;40(1):191-202.

Wang H, Diaz A, Moyer K, Mele-Casas M, Ara-Montojo MF, Torrus I, McCoy K, Mejias A, Leber AL. Molecular and Clinical Comparison of Enterovirus D68 Outbreaks among Hospitalized Children, Ohio, USA, 2014 and 2018. Emerging Infectious Diseases. 2019 Nov;25(11):2055-2063.