AABB President's Award
Dr. Latha Jagannathan, Medical Director and Managing Trustee, Bangalore Medical Services Trust, Rotary Bangalore TTK Blood Centre has been conferred with AABB (Association for the Advancement of Blood & Biotherapies) President’s Award 2023.
She has been awarded for advancing blood and biotherapies safety in India and for championing the AABB Quality Certificate program. The work involves increasing the blood safety and improving blood transfusion services to ensure both blood donors’ and patients’ safety
AABB President’s Awards are bestowed each year and honours “extraordinary public service and contributions of an individual or an organization in the health care arena”.
14 people were chosen for the honour this year representing 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.
There were 10 from the USA, 2 from Ukraine, 1 from Zambia and 1 from India. It is heartening to note that Dr. Latha is one among a very few Indians to have gotten this recognition.
BMST is the only NGO, standalone centre in India which has a blood bank, tissue bank, HLA Lab & Stem Cell Registry and therefore provides the wide spectrum of services in the field of blood, organ and cellular therapies.
- Blood Donor base of 5 lakh with 40% repeat donors
- Effective services provided, 24/7 to more than 90,000 patients per year
- Blood Storage Centres (BSCs) in 26 hospitals
- More than 30% of blood collected is issued to government hospitals free of cost
- HLA lab – one of the top 5 labs in India offering the latest tests for pre and post- transplant monitoring.
- Free transfusion services to around 80 – 100 Thalassemia patients every month.
- Close to 4500 allografts supplied pan-India in the last ten years through a network of more than 100 hospitals
- Thalassemia registry of 522 patients, 1362 blood samples from the patients’ relatives tested by Hemoglobin Variant, of which approximately 34% detected as Thalassemia carriers and counseled; 37 pregnant Thalassemia carriers facilitated for Chorio-Villus-Sample (CVS) testing of the fetus for Thalassemia status
Recognition & Awards
- Recognised as a Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (SIRO) by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, Ministry of Science & Technology, Government of India.
- First and only NGO blood bank in Karnataka to be accredited by the National Accreditation Board for Hospitals (NABH)
- Designated as a specialized laboratory of Rajiv Gandhi University of Health Sciences (RGUHS) and a Centre of Excellence in blood banking, immunohematology and tissue typing for collaborative research and training.
- Recognition by National AIDS Control Organization (NACO) for 100% voluntary blood donation.
- Kempegowda Award – 2007 in recognition of work in the area of voluntary blood donation.
- Awarded every year by KSAPS, for the highest collection of voluntary donor blood.
- It was adjudged the best training centre in blood banking and immunohematology in 2014 by the NBTC- CMC, Vellore- CDC, Atlanta, and the Christian Medical association of India, project on Blood Safety in India