From the Central Office
Celebrating the career of Dr. Yuyun Maryuningsih Soedarmono – and wishing her a very happy retirement from all of us at ISBT!
Erica Wood & Jenny White
Dr. Yuyun, as she is known to almost everyone in the blood transfusion field, recently retired from her role as Team Lead for Blood and other Products of Human Origin at the World Health Organization (WHO), following a decades-long career in public service. A large part of her work has beenwas devoted to improving global transfusion safety.
In Indonesia, Yuyun’s first role in medicine was as a general practitioner. Later she moved into transfusion medicine, with a focus on voluntary non-remunerated blood donations, good manufacturing practice (GMP) for blood establishments, and safety across the entire transfusion chain, including improving clinical practice and haemovigilance. During this time, Yuyun was the Congress President for the ISBT Regional Congress held in Bali, Indonesia in 2015, and she also served as a member of the ISBT Board.
From 2018-2026, Yuyun worked at the WHO in the Geneva HQ, supporting colleagues in many countries around the world. Soon after joining WHO, and faced with the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Yuyun co-ordinated fast-moving WHO/ISBT collaborations to generate, gather and share information on convalescent plasma and the impact of the pandemic on blood services.
At WHO, Yuyun oversaw and facilitated a wide range of invaluable of projects and WHO publications on all aspects of blood safety, successfully bringing the international transfusion community together. In this role. she collaborated with many ISBT working parties and working party members, to contribute to the WHO.
Yuyun was instrumental in helping ISBT to navigate WHO processes and fulfil its role as a WHO Non-State Actor with input to guidelines, educational resources and support for workshops. For example, Yuyun worked closely with the ISBT Clinical Transfusion Working Party to update the Clinical Use of Blood modules and with the Haemovigilance Working Party to develop the Haemovigilance Toolkit leading to, among other successes, HV workshops in Burundi and Zambia. Yuyun’s valuable advice and dedication were essential in facilitating the formation of the International Coalition for Safe Plasma Proteins by the ISBT Global Blood Safety Working Party in 2022. This has supported the WHO Achilles project to increase availability of plasma-derived medicinal products in low- and middle-income countries, with ongoing projects in Senegal and Ethiopia that have included the organisation of WHO-led workshops to support blood regulation and advance GMP. On behalf of all ISBT members, we thank and congratulate Yuyun on her many contributions to the safety and sufficiency of the world’s blood supply, and wish her a happy and healthy retirement!
