March 26, 2024
Over the past four years, the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine weathered the considerable challenges it was confronted with due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine has contributed its effort in the battle against the pandemic by establishing a COVID-19 virus testing facility. In the three-year period from April 2020 to Dec 2022, we performed over half a million Covid-19 tests for Tulane and the community in the Great New Orleans Area. This facilitated the continuous operation of the University’s core activities including those vital to the research and education mission of the University. The successful implementation of the testing program would not be possible without the collaboration among many members of our community and the strong engagement and support from the leadership. The Faculty of our Department has also actively participated in multiple Covid-19 related research projects with internal and external collaborators, and their results have been published in high impact journals. Despite these many ongoing challenges, the Department maintained its sound foundation clinically, academically, and in research. Now, the pandemic is over, and we emerge standing on solid ground.
In the year of 2023, Tulane University Medical Center has undergone a major transformation: Tulane Medical Center forms the University Hospital System (UHS), which is composed of East Jefferson General Hospital (EJGH), Tulane Medical Center Downtown Facility, Lakeside Hospital and Lakeview Hospital in partnership with the LCMC Health System, which is based at the Greater New Orleans region and is composed of several other hospitals, including the Louisiana Children's Hospital and University Medical Center (UMC). EJGH is now the flagship hospital of the Tulane Medical Center, but it has a long history of serving the local community.
With the physical move of the TMC’s major workforce to EJGH in January 2024, thus begins the full scale of our integration with the new health system. The Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine is now providing clinical services at multiple sites, including EJGH, Lakeside Hospital and UMC. While the outlook is bright, the challenges are real to have a successful integration. These include forging a shared strategic vision of building a new academic medical center within the UHS/LCMC frame; engaging physicians in decision making and gaining their buy-in; streamlining the clinical workflows and operations; standardizing protocols, policies, and procedures across the sites, and enhancing the education and research missions of the medical center. We believe that we will succeed in this process so long as we work with a careful planning, transparent communication, and unwavering commitment to our academic missions, as we look forward to lead our faculty, residents and staff to achieve the success
Xiao-Ming Yin, MD, PhD, FAASLD, FCAP
Dr. Donald R. Pulitzer and Donna G. Pulitzer Professor and Chair
Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine
