ASLM2018 Awards Ceremony

The biennial ASLM Awards Ceremony recognizes individuals and laboratories committed to strengthening laboratory medicine in Africa. Below are some of the award categories.

Awards will be presented onsite at the ASLM2018 international conference in Abuja, Nigeria. 

Best Laboratory Champion Clinician Award 

The ASLM2018 Best Laboratory Champion Clinician Award seeks to promote and recognise an exceptional clinician in the field of public health whose work has had a profound impact and/or benefit on laboratory medicine in Africa.

Clinicians who meet the following criteria are eligible (self-nomination is acceptable):

  • Playing a key role in providing laboratory services to under served and hard to reach populations.
  • Promoting the integration of laboratory services in individual health.
  • Serving/practicing in public and/or private clinics or hospitals.
  • Advocating for laboratory-based diagnosis.
  • Influential in laboratory policy development.
  • Strengthening laboratory-clinician interface.

Best Practice in Laboratory Medicine Award 

The ASLM2018 Best Practice in Laboratory Medicine Award seeks to promote and recognise a sustained laboratory improvement/best practice leading to tangible and replicable outcomes for enhanced quality in laboratory systems and patient care. Nominations from any resource-limited setting are acceptable, including from outside Africa.

Nominations for the Best Practice Award should demonstrate the following:

  • Contributes towards improvement in outcomes for laboratory medicine in areas like diagnosis, surveillance, turn-around time, quality assurance, referral systems, biosafety or biosecurity, receiving specimens, developing guidelines, contribution to policy, or other improvement projects.
  • Nominated practice is the best way, one of the best ways, or a proven way to achieve or contribute toward achieving the improvement in outcomes for laboratory medicine (which is replicable and worthy of adoption by others).
  • Has tangible positive impact, or the practice captured improvement in a newly introduced method over a course of time in comparison to the baseline data.
  • If applicable, illustrates the use of quality assurance (including compliance self-assessment) methods and/or continuous quality improvement principles to develop, check, or prove that a practice is the best practice.
  • Practice is replicable and can be (or has been) widely adopted or adapted.
  • Demonstrates leadership by example.

Certificate of Recognition for Laboratory Accreditation 

Accreditation is the recognition of a laboratory’s quality of work and competence to perform well. ASLM commends accredited laboratories for choosing to strengthen and improve their laboratories through the accreditation process.

ASLM is seeking to recognise accredited government laboratories in Africa. All African government laboratories that have become accredited or re-accredited between 6 October 2016 and 5 October 2018 are eligible for recognition.

Lifetime Achievement Award 

The ASLM2018 Lifetime Achievement Award seeks to recognise an exceptional individual whose outstanding contributions and leadership to laboratory medicine have made a positive impact on public health.

These contributions may be a new innovation, new knowledge, or ways to improve professional practice. Importantly, the contributions should be above and beyond the call of duty and have had a long lasting impact in the public health sector.

ASLM will recognise an exceptional individual who meets the following criteria:

  1. The majority of nominee’s work must have occurred in the public health field with focus on laboratory medicine.
  2. The nominee is respected by his or her peers within the country, region and internationally.
  3. The nominee has an established history of distinguished service (30+ years of experience).
  4. The nominee has made a lasting contribution to laboratory medicine.
  5. The nominee has exhibited leadership and provided inspiration to others in the sector, as well as positively influenced public health on a national and international level.

ASLM2018 Outbreak Hero Award

  • The ASLM2018 Outbreak Hero Award seeks to recognise an exceptional individual whose outstanding contributions and leadership have contributed to prevent and control an infectious outbreak.
  • These contributions may be a new innovation, new knowledge, or ways to improve professional practice. Importantly, the contributions should be above and beyond the call of duty and have had a long lasting impact in the public health sector.
  • ASLM will recognise an exceptional individual who meets the following criteria:
  • The nominee’s must have contributed significantly to control an infectious outbreak at local and national level, through community work, health care, research or the coordination of interventions.
  • The nominee has made a lasting contribution to the standard of care, knowledge, regulation or practice in relation to outbreak response and prevention
  • The nominee has exhibited leadership and provided inspiration to others in the sector, as well as positively influenced public health, on a national and international level.
  • Nomination instructions:
  • To ensure that your nomination form is reviewed in a timely manner, it is critical to submit your completed nomination form (along with required and optional attachments) before Friday, 30 November 2018.
  • Email nominations are not accepted, only nominations submitted via this online submission form will be considered.
  • Posthumous nominees will not be accepted.