Meet Dr. Delaney
Meghan Delaney, D.O., M.P.H., Chief of Pathology and Lab Medicine, is an internationally recognized expert in the field of transfusion medicine. At Children’s, Dr. Delaney leads efforts to unify Anatomic Pathology and Laboratory Medicine into a single division while advancing cutting-edge practices in the division to ensure the highest standard of quality and safety for patients. Dr. Delaney earned a Bachelor of Science in biology from the University of Vermont, doctor of osteopathy degree from the New England College of Osteopathic Medicine and Master of Public Health from the University of Washington. She completed her residency in clinical pathology at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School and a fellowship in transfusion medicine and blood banking at the Puget Sound Blood Center in Seattle, WA. Following her fellowship, she held several leadership roles in the Seattle area, including serving as medical director at the Pediatric Apheresis Program at Seattle Children’s Hospital & Seattle Cancer Care Alliance, the blood bank at Seattle Children’s Hospital and the Immunohematology & Red Blood Cell Genomics Reference Laboratory at Bloodworks NW, the regional blood supplier.
Dr. Delaney serves as a member of the editorial board of Transfusion, chair of the AABB Transfusion Medicine Pediatric Subcommittee and chair of the American Society of Apheresis Pediatric Subcommittee. She has authored 51 peer-reviewed articles, 20 chapters and editorials; and has presented nearly three dozen lectures nationally and internationally for the AABB, American Society for Apheresis, the Association of Molecular Pathology, the International Society of Blood Transfusion and the Canadian Society of Transfusion Medicine, among others.
In addition to her substantial work here in the United States, Dr. Delaney has been actively involved with global health outreach for over ten years. Pursuing a passion for international health, sparked by a childhood full of exposure to other cultures and nations, Dr. Delaney recalls, “going back to wanting to be a physician–I’ve always wanted to use my skills to not only help people in America but the rest of the world as well.”
While getting her public health degree with a focus in global health, Dr. Delaney traveled to Ghana for a practicum. Providing her expertise for an assessment of the local hospital’s transfusion services, she saw first-hand the serious obstacles to safe and available transfusion. “That’s one of the biggest differences between here and low and middle resource countries,” says Dr. Delaney, “access to transfusion and blood banking are lifesaving. It’s not optional or additional. It’s something you need to survive.” In addition to being a crucial treatment option, Dr. Delaney sees laboratories as “the cornerstones” of modern medicine, required to support most modern standards of care. Without it, these communities cannot meet their current emergency needs and it may hold them back from being able to make major improvements in advancing their standards of care.
In Ghana for her first global health visit, Dr. Delaney witnessed a woman bleed to death after giving birth in the local hospital. “She had several other children,” remembers Dr. Delaney, “losing your mom is bad enough, but if you lose your mom and you live in poverty…what are you going to do?” Postpartum hemorrhage kills over 600,000 women annually, estimates Dr. Delaney, and almost all of them are in sub-Saharan Africa. “I found a real niche for myself,” she says, “I’m a blood transfusion expert, and there is a tremendous need for that kind of support in low and middle income countries. Transfusion here we just take it for granted, but without it, it can mean life or death.”
Once she had completed her training and was working as an attending, Dr. Delaney decided to more actively pursue her global commitment. Partnering with Linda Barnes at Bloodworks NW, who is involved in implementation science work, they created and ran a three-day symposium in Kampala, Uganda on transfusion, focusing on issues pertinent to the local population. “We had all these providers, from surgeons to pediatricians to obstetricians,” recalls Dr. Delaney, “it was great.” Recently, she finished a project in Mbarara, Uganda in which she and her team helped the local hospital identify and utilize local blood donors to establish a more advanced blood cross matching test. “We proved that if you help them learn how to do the blood banking on their own, step by step, it is sustainable and can lead to improved outcomes,” she says.
Actively involved in implementing this same quality assurance and technical development in other African countries, Dr. Delaney has been working in Côte d’Ivoire. Following the phase out of funding from the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDs Relief (PEPFAR) for many blood banks in this region, local health officials are facing a problem: how to fund a resource that was financially supported for years with now quite limited funds and a long list of needs. “The decision is, rightfully, being made that there are more many concerns that need to be funded,” says Dr. Delaney, “but really, they need the infrastructure of the nationalized transfusion services to support the patients.” To aid in the transition, Dr Delaney and colleagues are working to support Côte d’Ivoire’s laboratory and blood bank quality assurance and technical programs to be able to have a sustainable program into the future.
Her last, more personal global health project, she calls Bloodpak; “going back to what drives me–it’s this project. I love this project.” Dr. Delaney and her colleague from Seattle, Linda Barnes, developed a backpack with everything you need to collect blood and transfuse blood, sans any refrigeration. Accompanying the pack is an app which guides users through operating the device. “Bloodpak was designed for when you need emergency, lifesaving transfusion,” says Dr. Delaney. The transportability and extreme utility of the pack have great potential to prevent deaths caused by lack of access to transfusion, especially in the most rural communities without any consistent medical care available, reports Dr. Delaney. She and her team recently travelled to Kenya in June, where they are gearing up for a clinical trial of the Bloodpak.
New to Children’s in 2017, Dr. Delaney brings her nationally recognized expertise in transfusion medicine to both CNHS patients and, increasingly, to children all around the world. Combining her passion for laboratory medicine and blood banking with her keen interest in advancing access to transfusion and pediatric care internationally, Dr. Delaney actively utilizes her ability to educate and innovate to help level the global health playing field and improve care here at home.