CentraState - Healthy Directions

www.centrastate.com Spring 2014 3 B eing a patient can be a whirlwind experience. Depending on your condition, you can see a multitude of different physicians, specialists, hospital staff, etc. Your physician or specialist may provide you with treatment options for your illness, but in most cases, it is the pathology department that determines your diagnosis by analyzing blood and tissue samples. Included among the many pathology services that occur behind the scenes of your health care are cytopathology (study of cells), surgical pathology, hematology, blood banking, and microbiology for infectious diseases. CentraState's Department of Pathology is a full-service laboratory that operates 24/7, providing outpatient and inpatient services, helping to provide the highest quality medical care possible to the community, particularly in cases of cancer, with the aid of state-of-the-art equipment. CentraState's pathology department is unique in that it uses a real-time high-definition imaging system for consultations on complicated pathology cases—one of the first hospitals in the country with such a system. Usually, to obtain an outside consultation on a case, the pathology slides have to be marked, packed, and shipped off to another lab, analyzed by that department, and then sent back—a process that takes precious time. No patient wants to nervously wait days for answers, especially in the event of a cancer diagnosis. CANCER ANSWERS To facilitate the cancer diagnosis process, CentraState uses the Realtime Telepathology Imaging System TM to share high-definition images of the pathology slides instantaneously with the team of pathologists at the John Theurer Cancer Center at Hackensack University Medical Center. CentraState recently formed an oncological affiliation with Hackensack University Medical Center Health Network, due in part to the outstanding reputation of their pathology department. This affiliation gives CentraState access to Hackensack Pathology Group's team of 14 board-certified anatomical and clinical pathologists with multiple pathology subspecialties, including: • Bone and soft tissue • Lung and thoracic • Neurologic • Gastrointestinal • Endocrine • Liver • Genitourinary • Breast • Gynecologic • Ear, nose and throat • Medical parasitological • Hematopathology (diseases of the blood) • Dermatopathology (diseases of the skin) • Cytopathology (diseases on the cellular level) The ability to utilize the talents and knowledge of this group truly sets CentraState apart from the other hospitals in the region. To strengthen this affiliation, CentraState brought on board Paul Simon, DO, board-certified pathologist and Hackensack Pathology Group physician, as medical director of CentraState's Department of Pathology. "Our goal is to prevent error," Dr. Simon says. "The more highly trained pathologists you can have looking at a case, the more beneficial it is to the patient." Federal law requires that all cancer cases be reviewed by a second pathologist. CentraState takes this one step further, because of the multiple sets of eyes that review certain pathology cases via the real-time system. "They're not only double- and triple- checked, they're more than quadruple- checked," Dr. Simon says. "Pathology is not always black and white; there are varying shades of gray to many pathology cases. Human disease is on a continuum sometimes open to subjective interpretation." Due to the efficiency of this system, the majority of tumor cases are reported within 24 hours. "We've saved days on a patient's diagnosis and get them answers efficiently," Dr. Simon says. "As a specialty, pathologists are kind of behind the scenes, and many people aren't aware of our importance in health care." CentraState's laboratory is staffed by board-certified pathologists, certified medical technologists and medical technicians, histotechnicians, phlebotomists, clerks and transcriptionists. It is accredited by the College of American Pathologists (CAP), AABB (formerly called the American Association of Blood Banks), New Jersey Department of Health and Human Services, and Center for Medicare and Medicaid Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA 88). For more information, call the pathology department at 732-294-2971. HD Pathology: Working Behind the Scenes Paul Simon, DO, board-certified pathologist

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