AABB23: Congratulations to the 2023 President’s Award Recipients

Among the highlights of the 2023 AABB Annual Meeting’s General Session, AABB President Brian Gannon, MBA, announced this year’s President’s Awards recipients.

The 14 people chosen for the honor this year represent a wide variety of geographic locations and practice types within the blood and biotherapies field and have worked on some of our community’s most notable initiatives.

The AABB President’s Awards are bestowed annually and the recipients are selected each year by the AABB president. The honor recognizes “extraordinary public service and contributions of an individual or an organization in the health care arena” and recipients are honored for work that “furthers AABB’s goals and missions.”

Below is a list of the 2023 AABB President’s Award recipients, along with their citation. Congratulations to this year’s honorees!

• Dr. Graham Sher

  For facilitating and enabling an invaluable collaborative effort with AABB in the development of materials to assist American blood collection facilities in preparing for the implementation of individual donor assessments to determine blood donor eligibility. 

• Brian Custer, MPH, PhD

  On behalf of the ADVANCE Study team
  For successfully leading the ADVANCE study, which provided critical data that supported FDA’s decision that the US could safely and effectively implement individual donor assessments to determine blood donor eligibility. 

• John Hagins

  For successful leadership of the AABB Interorganizational Task Force on Domestic Disasters and Acts of Terrorism and for critical work to ensure the adequacy and stabilization of the U.S. blood supply during and after the COVID-19 pandemic.

• Peter Marks, MD, PhD 

  For continuous work supporting the U.S. blood community, for promoting public policies that support a safe and available blood supply, and for championing public messaging about the importance of blood donation. 

• Chris Hrouda

  For exceptional dedication and support of the AABB Foundation throughout the past decade and for leading work to ensure a successful and effective reimagining of the Foundation. 

• Jeanne E. Hendrickson, MD 

  For critical work developing a nationwide antibody registry, which represents an important advancement to further optimize the safety of blood transfusion for patients throughout the United States.

• Ronald George Hauser III, MD

  For critical work developing a nationwide antibody registry, which represents an important advancement to further optimize the safety of blood transfusion for patients throughout the United States.

• Christopher A. Tormey, MD

  For critical work developing a nationwide antibody registry, which represents an important advancement to further optimize the safety of blood transfusion for patients throughout the United States.

• Claudia Cohn, MD, PhD

  For critical work developing a nationwide antibody registry, which represents an important advancement to further optimize the safety of blood transfusion for patients throughout the United States.

• Dr. Joseph Mulenga

  On behalf of Zambia National Blood Transfusion
  For critical leadership in implementing new systems that help to advance transfusion medicine safety in Zambia.

• Latha Jagannathan, MD

  For advancing blood and biotherapies safety in India and for championing the AABB Quality Certificate program. 

• Chris Miskel

  For critical leadership in expanding health care and career opportunities in transfusion medicine to underserved communities as well as for providing a model by which to help additional similar efforts succeed.

• Gavin Evans
  On behalf of Global Blood Fund
  For extraordinary leadership in supporting transfusion medicine professionals in war-torn areas of Ukraine.

• Iryna Slavinska
  On behalf of Donor.UA
  For invaluable work in helping to maintain the safety, adequacy and continuity of the blood supply in Ukraine amidst extraordinary challenges.