ADAO 13th Annual International Asbestos Awareness and Prevention Conference
“Where Knowledge and Action Unite”
April 7 – 9, 2017
Renaissance Arlington Capital View Hotel
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Posted on March 1, 2017
The Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization (ADAO) is proud to present a weekly series “Meet the Speakers, Honorees, and Leadership,” which will highlight the esteemed participants of our highly anticipated 13th Annual International Asbestos Awareness & Prevention Conference! The ADAO conference, which will take place on April 7-9, 2017 in Washington, D.C., combines nearly 40 expert opinions, victims’ stories, and new technological advancements from across the globe into one united voice raising awareness about asbestos. ADAO is the only U.S. nonprofit that organizes annual conferences dedicated solely to preventing asbestos exposure and eliminating asbestos-caused diseases. Register Here Today!
Session II Speakers: Mike Mattmuller; Edward Emmett, MD; Michael R. Harbut, MD, MPH, FCCP; Marie-Claude Jaurand, MD; Steven Markowitz, MD, DrPH; Tracy McNew, LPN, MPA
Session II Moderator: Dr. Raja Flores
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Mike Mattmuller, Mesothelioma Patient and ADAO Eastern Co-Regional Director, was born in Mayfield Heights, OH, but now lives in Westminster, MD and works as a civil engineer. Since being diagnosed with mesothelioma four years ago at age 29, Mike and his wife, Jessica, have become strong advocates to ban asbestos and promote research for a cure. Mike has shared his story at several Congressional Briefings and in meetings with the EPA. Mike and Jessica had their first baby, Riley Jean, in June 2016. The Mattmullers are also receiving the 2017 Alan Reinstein Award for their inspiring work and dedication to our.
Dr. Raja Flores (Moderator), Dr. Irving Selikoff Lifetime Achievement Award recipient, is a recognized leader in the field of thoracic surgery for his pioneering efforts in the treatment of mesothelioma. Dr. Flores’ research interests include numerous past projects relating to the multimodality management of malignant pleural mesothelioma. He helped pioneer the use of intraoperative chemotherapy for mesothelioma and led a multi-center trial designed to improve patient outcomes. He changed the surgical management of pleural mesothelioma cancer with a landmark study comparing extrapleural pneumonectomy and pleurectomy/decortication. An expert in his field, Dr. Flores has appeared on many national and local television news reports to discuss mesothelioma. With over 150 related publications to date, his energies and commitment to the plight of mesothelioma patients remains paramount.
Edward Emmett, MD graduated in Medicine at the University of Sydney, has an MS degree in Environmental Heath from the University of Cincinnati, and is a specialist in Occupational and Environmental Medicine. He is Professor and Director of Academic Programs in Occupational Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania, Perelman School of Medicine in Philadelphia. From 1988 to 1996 he was Chief Executive of the National Occupational Health and Safety Commission (Worksafe Australia), during which time national standards for asbestos were developed. Recently, his particular research focus has been the impact of environmental hazards on communities; his work with communities exposed to the chemical PFOA received the international Community Campus Partnership for Health Award in 2008. As Director of the Community Engagement Core for the Superfund Research and Training Center directed at exposures leading to asbestos-related diseases, he is researching communities including Ambler Pennsylvania, once the world’s largest asbestos-cement manufacturing site.
Michael R. Harbut, MD, MPH, FCCP is Chief of the Center for Occupational and Environmental Medicine and a Clinical Assistant Professor at Wayne State University, School of Medicine in Detroit, Michigan. An internationally known expert in the diagnosis and treatment of environmental and workplace diseases, Dr. Harbut has been named co-Director of the National Center for Vermiculite and Asbestos Related Cancers. He is the co-author of the American Thoracic Society’s 2004 Recommendations for the Diagnosis and Treatment of Non-Malignant Disease Caused by Asbestos Exposure. Dr. Harbut is a past chair of the occupational and environmental health section of the American College of Chest Physicians, and has served on the Board of Directors of the Mesothelioma Applied Research Foundation. Dr. Harbut brings his expertise to address the need for early diagnosis and aggressive treatment of asbestos related diseases.
Marie-Claude Jaurand, MD, is Director of Research at the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM). She received a Ph.D. in Biophysics in 1981, at the University Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris VI). Dr. Jaurand formerly worked on the physico-chemical properties of asbestos fibres. She further developed alternative methods to animal experiments, especially using mesothelial cells, in order to investigate the mechanisms of action of asbestos on pleural cells. Her research mainly focused on genotoxicity. Later she moved to develop researches on the biology of human mesothelioma. She organised the First International Mesothelioma Conference where the International Mesothelioma Interest Group (IMIG) was founded. From 1999-2002, she was the head of the E9909 INSERM team “Oncogenesis of Respiratory and Urogenital Tumours” at the Paris XII University. Dr. Jaurand has written numerous book chapters, edited books, and published more than 200 research contributions. She organised several International Conferences on the In vitro effects of dusts. She participated to and is currently involved in several advisory panels on health effects of fibres and airborne particles. She also was a member of different scientific committees at INSERM and University and cancer associations.
Steven Markowitz, MD, DrPH, an occupational medicine physician, directs the commoner Center for Health and the Environment (CCHE) at Queens College, City University of New York. He is Adjunct Professor of Preventive Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine. He received his B.A. from Yale University. With the United Steelworkers, Dr. Markowitz directs the Worker Health Protection Program, a national medical screening program for Department of Energy nuclear weapons workers that has used low-dose CT scanning to screen over 11,000 workers for early lung cancer detection since 2000. Dr. Markowitz and CCHE currently partner with Make the Road New York to address occupational hazards that Latino day laborers face when performing Hurricane Sandy clean-up work. Dr. Markowitz is Editor-in-Chief of the American Journal of Industrial Medicine (AJIM) and the Associate Editor of a major textbook, Environmental and Occupational Medicine, 4th Edition.
David McCumber is the editor of The Montana Standard. Previously, he was Washington Bureau Chief for Hearst Newspapers, and has led newsrooms large and small over a career spanning nearly 50 years. He was managing editor of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer for the last nine years of that newspaper’s print existence, during which the paper won several national awards for investigative and narrative journalism. McCumber is the author of three nonfiction books: “X-Rated: The Mitchell Brothers (Simon & Schuster), made into a film starring Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez; Playing off the Rail: A Pool Hustler’s Journey (Random House); and The Cowboy Way: Seasons of a Montana Ranch (Avon). He is the co-author, with investigative reporter Andrew Schneider, of the book “An Air that Kills: How the Asbestos Poisoning of Libby, Montana Uncovered a National Scandal” (Putnam), based on a story Schneider broke while working with McCumber at the Seattle P-I. During his time at the San Francisco Examiner, where he was Sunday editor, city editor and an assistant managing editor, he edited Hunter S. Thompson’s weekly column for about three years. He subsequently served as the editor of two of Thompson’s books. He was the founding editor and publisher of the magazine Big Sky Journal. McCumber was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in 1984 for a series of stories he directed and helped to write on a defense-industry scandal in Tucson, Arizona.
Tracy McNew, LPN, MPA is the Clinical Care and Research Manager at the Center for Asbestos Related Disease (CARD) in Libby, Montana. She has been working at CARD for over 7 years and has built strong ties to the Libby community. She is married and has a daughter in third grade. Tracy has been a nurse for nearly 20 years and enjoys the unique opportunities to make a difference in people’s lives at CARD. CARD’s role in the community of Libby includes screening, outreach, advocacy, and holistic care for patients with asbestos related illnesses. CARD strives to meet medical needs of patients while also providing case management, education, and assistance navigating support programs. Tracy works one on one with patients as part of CARD’s lung cancer screening program and also manages clinical and research staff providing services to patients.
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Check back next week for the fifth installment of “Speakers, Honorees, and Leadership,” featuring our 2017 conference Session III speakers.
In unity,
Linda
The Asbestos Disease Awareness Organization (ADAO), a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, does not make legal referrals.