PATH News Network Daily Edition

An Opportunity to Serve Your Community

• College of American Pathologists

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0:00 | 6:04
Nick Lanyi

An opportunity to serve your community. A potential new target for Parkinson's. And an answer to the perennial question: what the heck do pathologists do? These stories and more coming up next. This is Path News Network daily edition from the College of American Pathologists. I'm Nick Lanyi. It's Tuesday, June 9th. The CAP Foundation's See Test & Treat Program provides funding to institutions across the U.S. to provide free access to cervical cancer and other crucial preventative screenings, as well as health education and follow-up care. Nearly 9,000 women have participated since the foundation launched the program in 2011. It's a valuable opportunity to bring the power of diagnostic medicine to medically underserved populations. The program's application process for 2027 begins next week. The foundation will accept applications from June 18th to September 4th. All applications must be submitted through the Foundation's online portal. The application includes several required submissions. So if you would like to lead a See Test & Treat program at your institution, it's time to get started. For more information, go to foundation.cap.org. Although medicine has made progress in treating symptoms of Parkinson's disease, it remains incurable and its progression can't be slowed. But researchers at the University of Pennsylvania's Perelman School of Medicine reported a promising finding on that front in the journal Neuron last month. Earlier research identified glycoprotein non-metastatic melanoma B, or GPNMB, as a key molecule in understanding Parkinson's. GPNMB damages brain tissue, which in turn causes more GPNMB to be produced, and that vicious cycle drives the disease's progression. The researchers reported that they have developed antibodies in the laboratory that can block GPNMB, which could eventually lead to a medicine that slows the disease in humans. If you're frustrated with ever-evolving payer requirements resulting in claim denials for your practice or laboratory, sign up for next week's webinar on the reimbursement landscape in 2026 and beyond, sponsored by the CAP's Practice Management Committee. The one-hour session on June 16th at 1 p.m. Central will feature experienced practitioners providing practical insights and tips on dealing with the current reimbursement landscape, emerging payer trends, and the most common pressure points affecting pathology practices today. Go to the CAP website, events section to register. And finally, here's a place to send anyone who asks you to explain what exactly pathology is. The CAP Foundation's latest podcast is a deliberately short and simple primer meant to explain what pathology is, why it matters, and the critical role pathologists play, even if it's sometimes invisible to patients. The podcast's guest is Dr. Diana Cardona, Chair of Pathology at Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and vice chair of the CAP's Council on Government and Professional Affairs. They asked Dr. Cardona, what do pathologists do?

Dr. Diana Cardona

Pathology is a medical specialty that essentially determines what is your disease, like what is actually happening. And they do that by looking at blood, tissue samples, sometimes body fluids. Usually if folks know about pathology, they know because of forensics or autopsies, but that's really just a very small portion of what we do because we're really behind the scenes. Our work is in the lab.

Nick Lanyi

They also posed a hypothetical question. What if pathology disappeared tomorrow?

Dr. Diana Cardona

Yeah. So all the instruments and the fancy tools that you see inside a laboratory would all still be there, right? But it's the experts behind those instruments, behind the diagnoses that wouldn't be there, ensuring that it's being done correctly, safely, with the highest degree of quality. Cancer care would almost essentially come to a stall because you wouldn't be sure that you're giving the patients the right diagnoses. Infections may not be treated effectively, and a lot more broad antibiotics would be given, which are hopefully traditionally could be quite toxic for patients, and that's dangerous. There could be delays in folks being able to have their surgeries done or ensuring that the surgery was done appropriately because that interoperative consultation by the pathologist wouldn't be available. And so, really, I think that clinicians would be almost flying blind because they wouldn't have the pathologist there to provide them diagnostic certainty.

Nick Lanyi

A pretty good argument for keeping pathology around and fairly reimbursed. Well, that's all for today. See the show notes for more information on today's stories. And if you've got a story to share, write us at stories at CAP.org. We'll be back Wednesday at 5 a.m. Eastern for another episode of the Daily Edition. I'm Nick Lanyi. Have a wonderful day.