Meeting & Agendas

Terry Kotrla Welcomes all guests

a. Forms to fill out. b. Volunteers to review curriculum to ensure material is at entry level. Link to MLT course materials: http://www.austincc.edu/mlt/mlt_courses.html c. IMPORTANT- We will need advisory committee members to attend a site visit meeting to answer questions posed by site visitors.

a. Allow ACC faculty to perform mini-clinicals at your site to familiarize themselves with current technology and get input on how we can mirror those activities on campus. b. Freeze and save unusual patient samples for student laboratory, especially Serology and Blood Bank. c. Donation of outdated reagents – Please post handout d. Donation of in-date supplies e. Materials for case studies – Please post handout f. Assistance with recruiting – If you see a lab assistant or phlebotomist that shows interest in the lab portion of their job, try to place a ‘bug in their ear’ about our program and see if they might be interested in furthering their education.

a. Number of openings for MLTs & PHBs- is ACC meeting the needs? If not, what can be done to enhance recruitment? 1. Openings coming up for after-hours clinics real soon. 2. There is a need for employees that have the amount of training that ACC students graduate with. b. Weaknesses of graduates? Is there a consistent weakness among new graduates? 1. No apparent weaknesses for the new graduates.

Terry Kotrla starts introductions and everyone takes their turn introducing themselves one by one.

a. Number of Graduates – 11 Graduates b. ASCP results – ASCP provides a report with results from all students who take the exam. Back in the summer of 2008, a major curriculum change was made. The students now have a concentrated final year of their MLT classes. Since this change was made, there has been a 100 percent pass rate for this test. Our second year of the degree plan consists of the bulk of our MLT courses, (Hematology, Coagulation, Urinalysis and Body fluids, Clinical Chemistry, etc). We’ve developed the first year of our curriculum to consist of our pre and co-requisites; Chemistry, Anatomy & Physiology, Phlebotomy, Cellular Molecular Biology, etc. These first year courses are ‘weeding out’ those weaker students who would be unsuccessful in the MLT courses. If a student cannot pass Phlebotomy or the Cellular and Molecular Biology they will most likely be unable to pass the MLT Courses. This curriculum change appears to be working for our program and is the reason we are having such great success with our passing rates. c. Second Year – Twelve students admitted. We could admit up to 17 students with assistance in the laboratory, but 12 is much easier to handle since we share a lab with Biotechnology. d. First Year – 31 students on track to start the program for the Fall of 2010. We are not worried about this number being so high because of the opening of the ACC Round Rock Campus next year. We will have our own space and lab in the facility. This will allow us eventually to double the number of students we can admit into our program. Theoretically we would have 15 students at the Eastview location and 15 attending the Round Rock Campus. In addition to these students we also have approximately 70 prospective students that are taking basic courses, pre-requisites, etc. These students are those that are on track to come into our program in 2011 or 2012.

a. Traditional – This certificate program is offered 3 times a year (once each semester). Due to the popularity of this course, and the large number of applicants, we actually had to add another class for the Spring of 2009. We’ll graduate approximately 57 Phlebotomy Students in 2009. Even though this may seem like a high number, we are not concerned that we will flood the market because about 60 percent of our students are those that are waiting to get into other programs, (Nursing, MLT, Radiology, etc). b. Tech Prep – We have articulation agreements with 3 High Schools now. The longest standing agreement we have maintained is with Leander ISD (6 years). We are trying to make the High School students aware of the MLT Program by offering Phlebotomy. This has not worked so far since we have yet to have any of our Tech Prep students enter into our MLT Program. Our curriculum is taught by their High School instructors who must meet NAACLS standards and be certified as a phlebotomist by ASCP and have the requisite experience before they can teach the curriculum. The student must pass the high school offered course with an 80 or above in order to complete the clinical portion with us. The first four days of the clinical portion we bring the students on campus and have them start on their ‘live draws’. They practice on the ‘dummy’ arms, and then practice on each other. We have found that these students perform just as well as the ‘Traditional’ Phlebotomy Students. Sixteen students completed the Phlebotomy certificate this Summer. They are then awarded 3 credit hours for the Phlebotomy taken in high school. c. ASCP Results – Certification scores have always been higher than the national average. National pass rates are around 84 percent. Our students pass rate for the past 5 years is right around 94 percent.

a. Started 2 years ago with a grant through the Governor’s office. We have completed two classes, graduating 6 each year. The most we can accept for one class is 12 due to the availability of clinical spots. The first course is online and is set for open enrollment. The second class is a hybrid course and will be held on 4 Saturdays and will also include field trips to the state crime lab, a biotechnology company creating molecular kits and online assignments. The third class of the certificate is the clinical practicum and it is held during the Summer. b. Students who are currently working in the molecular lab of their employer can use their jobs to complete the clinical portion of the program.

a. Starting in July of 2005 and the last four years, they have decided to try and create a ‘career ladder’ composed of eight different levels. This would start with a Clinical Lab Assistant, which includes phlebotomy, and level eight would be a Doctorate in Clinical Lab Science. b. http://www.ascls.org/currentevents/index1.asp c. Concerns of MLT faculty – no molecular and no antibody identification at entry level for MLT. d. Comments from Advisory Committee Members – No comments

Please review at your leisure and email Terry with any questions or comments. a. MLT Blood Bank Site Survey b. Blood Bank Written Comments c. MLT Clinical Chemistry Site Survey d. Chemistry Written Comments e. MLT Hematology/Coagulation Site Survey f. Hematology/Coagulation Written Comments g. MLT Microbiology Site Survey h. Microbiology Written Comments i. Phlebotomy Site Survey j. Phlebotomy Written Comments

a. We will be posting our needs on the web at the end of the semester. b. It doesn’t have to be during the day. If the workload can support a student on evenings, then it would be fine to schedule a student in the evenings. c. We have encountered problems with various other institutions placing their students in clinical rotations where our students usually are placed. We must work with these institutions as well as with the clinical sites to make sure we have plenty of room and sites to fit our students in. We ask for 1 rotation in each department, once a year. d. Benefit to the facility would be that they could try the person out and see if they might have the potential to be hired in the future.

a. Opportunity to offer multiple sections for MLT and phlebotomy. b. Offer evening classes for MLT c. Phlebotomy will be during the day.