Hope you all had a happy and safe Holiday season. As you may know, Quentin Letson has graciously offered to do the Region 1 Meeting at Atlanticare Regional Medical Center in Atlantic City, NJ again this year. It is a great place to visit and lots of fun. The meeting will be on Saturday April 14th, 2012, so mark your calendars now and start planning your trip. We are working out the details of lectures and vendors for this meeting. If you can think of any specific lectures that you think would be beneficial, please let either Quentin or myself know. The brochure will be on the website as soon as we can get the lectures topics and speakers confirmed.

We need more members in Region 1, so start telling all of your co-workers such as doctors, nurses, C.R.N.A’s, residents and your immediate co-workers whether they are certified or not, they can still become a member. If they are not certified encourage them to do so. Do not forget that anyone that does not take the Technologists exam by the year 2015, that individual will have to be a graduate of an accredited college that offers an Associate’s degree in Anesthesia Technology in order to sit for the Technologists exam. My goal is to increase the membership by 10% in 2012.Please help me reach my goal.

Last but not least, it is that time of year……If it was your year to recertify, and you have not done so, you have until the end of January to get your paperwork into Headquarters. There are late fees for anything received at headquarters after December 31st. If there is anything I can help you with please do not hesitate to contact me.

Jonnalee Bill
Region 1 Director for ASATT

Happy New year Region 2! It is going to be a spectacular year. Our annual Region 2 meeting will be held on March 31, 2012 at West Pennsylvania Hospital in Pittsburgh. Charlene Costanzo will be hosting, bring your walking shoes we will be going over to the “STAR” center which stands for Simulation, Teaching and Academic Research Center. This will give our member, non-member and students hands on experience. The other topic includes TEE, LMA, Firer in the OR, auto transfusion and changes happening with ASATT and our profession. Look for the brochure to be on the website by the end of January. I am very excited for this meeting and hope I will see you in Pittsburgh.

Congratulations to all of you that have re-certified as Technicians or Technologist. For the certified anesthesia technicians out there, start thinking about taking the Technologist exam. After July 2015 ASATT will require an associate’s degree to sit for the Technologist exam and will no longer offer the technician exam, do not get left behind. It will take individuals like you and I to keep our profession moving in the right direction, whether we stay a Technician or become at Technologist. The choice is yours.

Speaking of choices think about who you’re going to nominate for the Regional Educational Award. The award is for a Technician or Technologist that goes above and beyond to educate others in our profession. The award is presented at the national meeting, this year it will be held October 11-14 in Washington D.C. very exciting!  As always any questions or comments please feel free to contact me.

Kimberly Stack Cer. A.T.
Region 2 Director

Greetings Region 3 Members,

I Want to remind everyone that the grace period for renewing your certification is dwindling down, so if you have not yet submitted your packet and your certification expired 12/31/2011, time is of the essence! Remember, you can only submit CE’s earned from 2010 and 2011 and that you must provide documentation to support the CE’s requested. One other item of major importance: CE’s are awarded based on 50-60 minutes of lecture; these are whole units! For further details on the process, please refer to the Summer 2011 Sensor issue.

Our first regional meeting is scheduled for Saturday, April 21st at Catawba Valley Medical Center in Hickory, North Carolina. Many region 3 members are interested in taking the technologist exam and this educational conference will be designed to assist those technicians in preparation for sitting the exam. We are in the process of confirming speakers and topics and the hope is to have the registration brochure completed and posted to the website by mid-February. Even though the focus is preparing for the technologist exam, the lectures will provide pertinent information that will apply to the technician exam as well.

Don’t forget that we are accepting submissions for this year’s Tech Day poster. The winner will get a free membership to ASATT for 2012-2013!

Just to update everyone in case you haven’t heard, our Region 4 Annual Conference will be a one day conference to be held Saturday, April 28, 2012 in Naperville, Illinois this year. I was finally able to get it outside of Wisconsin to better give other members an easier opportunity to attend. I will be working with Vivian Clayton at Edward Hospital (Who is great at organizing these things!) to get this going. More details will be forthcoming. Just keep checking our Region 4 updates. I am in the process of getting Vendors and topics lined up for this so if anyone has any Vendors you would like contacted or topic suggestions please contact me so I can try to facilitate this. This is YOUR conference, so please let me know what you would like to see discussed or companies you would like to see products from.

ASATT is always open to getting new members. If you have anyone in your facility or know of someone in another facility that is not a member, please let them know of the benefits of becoming members and have them contact myself or ASATT headquarters with any questions they may have or to assist them with membership applications.

And as always, if you have any questions or concerns, please don’t hesitate to contact me at zellfam2@tds.net. If I am not able to answer your questions I will forward it on to someone who can. Stay warm!

Hello Region 5 and Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a blessed holiday season.

As we start 2012, think of ways you can build your anesthesia tech team. Try to encourage certification. Through certification, your team will be able to support each other at a much higher level. Good luck to everyone who has committed to writing the certification exam in the next couple of months.

The Region 5 conference planning is well on its way. Very soon I will be able to send the agenda. We have had some amazing educators volunteer to speak. I am truly excited about the topics that have been chosen. If you have not already marked your calendars, please do so now. Join us in Denver on April 21st. Feel free to contact me with any questions you may have.

Best wishes for 2012!

Charlene

Hello region 6!

I hope you all had a nice holiday! It is now time to focus on the year ahead! I am working with one of our fellow ASATT member in Nevada for the upcoming conference in Las Vegas. Some of you have brought it to my attention about the dates May 12-13, 2012. May 13 is Mothers day; instead of a full two day conference, we are looking at one full day and one half day. This will allow visitors to still enjoy their stay in the city! Please email me if you have topics of particular interest to you. Details on the venue will be sent out soon... please stay tuned!

Diane Alejandro-Harper

Greetings Region 7

I have spoken over the last couple of months about teamwork, reliability, taking initiative and respect for our patients and each other. I have asked for feedback and communication on how we can grow and be better as a profession and organization. To which I have received little.

So, today I am only here to wish you all a Happy and Safe New Year.

This year does bring several opportunities for CE’s and collaboration with your peers. Right now all of us who were due for renewal have either made the cut off or are scrambling during the grace period. For all of you scramblers planning may be in your future and what a better way to start than taking time this spring and summer to attend one of the three regional meetings. Your participation would be greatly appreciated.

Peaced
Joleen