The Historical Road of SACB  

In the 1970s, there were only very few clinical biochemists in Singapore. Five worked in the government Department of Pathology which was the national reference centre fathology and laboratory medicine within the Ministry of Health but not associated with any hospital. Besides the responsibility of providing a testing service for all public hospitals, the clinical biochemists were required to conduct education and training programmes for laboratory technical staff who must pass two departmental examinations in five years to qualify for permanent employment in hospital clinical laboratories by the Ministry of Health. There were also three or four biochemists working in research laboratories in the Singapore General Hospital and the university.  

After exposure to the activities of national associations of clinical biochemists overseas and learning about the professional activities of participants at various international congresses, Dr Tan It Koon considered the formation of a national association for the profession in Singapore. The impetus and urgency for the establishment of such an association came with the initiation of the first congress on clinical biochemistry for the Asian Pacific region as well as the formation of a regional federation for the profession.  

As a follow-up to Dr Tan's meeting with several prominent clinical biochemists from Australia and Japan (Professor David Curnow, Dr Robert Edwards and Professor Kiyoshi Miyai) at the IFCC International Congress in Toronto in 1975, several representatives of the Australian Association of Clinical Biochemists (AACB) came to Singapore in late 1977 to discuss the formation of a Regional Clinical Biochemistry Group in South-East Asia. At the same time, a decision to hold the first regional congress in 1979 in Singapore was made. 

A letter was sent to a number of clinical biochemists from various countries to inform them about the matters discussed during this meeting and the plan to hold the first major congress in the region. As the 1st South-East Asian Congress of Clinical Biochemistry was to be jointly organised by clinical biochemists from Singapore and Australia, with the greater part of work to be undertaken by members of the congress committee from Singapore, there was an urgent need to establish a Singapore national association.  

All congress publicity brochures would then carry the names of two national associations as the organisers, rather than the Australian association and an informal group in Singapore. A pro-tem committee was formed to draw up the constitution for the Singapore Association of Clinical Biochemists (SACB) and make official application to the Registry of Societies for registration of the association. The Committee comprised of the following: Dr Tan It Koon (President), Mr Chua Kim Seng (Secretary), Dr Chio Lee Foon (Treasurer), Dr Edward Jacob (member) and Dr Christopher Lam Wai Kei who subsequently moved to Hong Kong. Official application to the Registry of Societies was made on 9 November 1977. The Registrar of Societies responded on 14 December 1977 indicating requirement for minor amendments on the draft constitution. The revised constitution was submitted on 21 December 1977 and official approval for registration was given on 5 January 1978. Upon payment of the requisite registration fee, the SACB was formally registered on 12 January 1978 and the President, Secretary and Treasurer of SACB were required to call at the Registry on that date to sign the Societies Register. On 1st February 1978, the Registrar of Societies wrote to inform SACB that registration of our Association was published in the Singapore Government Gazette of 27 January 1978 as notification number 288. 

Announcement of this newly registered association was published in the local Chinese, English and Malay Press in May 1978. An inaugural meeting held earlier on 12 January 1978 was attended by the following founding members: Dr Tan It Koon (Chairman), Mr Chua Kim Seng (Secretary), Dr Chio Lee Foon, Dr Christopher Lam Wai Kei, Dr Edward Jacob, Dr Aw Swee Eng, Dr Seet Ai Mee, and Mr Lau Yeow Kok. Office bearers of the first Council was elected: Dr Tan It Koon (President), Mr Chua Kim Seng (Secretary), Dr Edward Jacob (Assistant Secretary), Dr Chio Lee Foon (Treasurer), Dr Aw Swee Eng (member), Dr Christopher Lam Wai Kei (member). Prior to the first Council Meeting on 24 February 1978, Dr Yo Sui Lan, Mrs Dixie Chua, Dr Teo Tian Seng and Mr Ow Ah Kit were accepted as ordinary members and Mr Ho Chee Kan and Mr Lim See Heng were admitted as associate members.  

With a total membership of only 14, the SACB must have been one of the smallest associations registered in Singapore. One of several logos proposed for the SACB by Dr Chio Lee Foon was selected by Council. The Registrar of Societies gave official approval for the use of this logo on 4 April 1978. Dr Tan continued to serve as President of SACB for the next 21 years. In recognition of the outstanding contributions Professor T P Whitehead from Birmingham, United Kingdom, had made towards the practice of clinical biochemistry in Singapore, particularly in the area of quality control, automation and computerisation, the SACB elected him as an Honorary Member. Mr Chua Kim Seng wrote to him as secretary of the association on 7 March 1978. Professor Whitehead promptly accepted the Honorary Membership and stated that he was deeply moved and honored by our invitation. Two awards were given out in recognition of members' achievements in or contributions to clinical biochemistry.  

Professor T P Whitehead offered to donate a cash prize for an award under his own name. This was to be given annually to young SACB members of not more than 35 years of age, for excellence in research. In 1985, Boehringer Mannheim Company offered another Award. This was known as the SACB-Boehringer Mannheim Award and was to be given to a member for outstanding contributions to the development and advancement of clinical biochemistry in Singapore. In 1999 when Boehringer Mannheim was bought over by Roche Diagnostics, the name of this award was changed to SACB-Roche Award.  

Past recipients of the awards are listed below. An application for membership of the International Federation of Clinical Chemistry (IFCC) was made on 2 January 1979. The IFCC Secretary, Dr Anders Kallner responded on 19 May 1979 that application was approved by the Executive Board and required a mail ballot by Council Members or representatives of national societies for their acceptance. On 4 September 1979, Dr Kallner informed us that Council had accepted SACB officially as a Member of the IFCC.  

Throughout the years Dr Tan It Koon served as a national representative for SACB on IFCC Council, he was active in various committees e.g. associate member for various expert panels, member of Steering Committee, Awards Committee and Nomination Committee. As a result of his involvement and contributions, he was elected as the first member of the Executive Board from Asia and served from 1985 to 1990.  

The SACB bid for the hosting of IFCC International Congress 4 times during the IFCC General Council Meetings held in conjunction with the XII Congress at Rio de Janeiro (1984), the XIII Congress at The Hague (1987), the XIV Congress in San Francisco (1990) and the XV Congress in Melbourne. At the XIII Congress, SACB was persuaded to support the Australian Association. On the other occasions, SACB lost narrowly to the winning associations from Europe and America.  

Organisation of the 1st South-East Asian & Pacific Congress of Clinical Biochemistry scheduled for 14-19 October 1979 at the Shangri-La Hotel was the first important project and major activity of the Association. The congress organising committee consisted of Dr Tan It Koon and Dr Margot Baillie (Australia) as joint Chairpersons, Dr Ron Bowyer (Australia) as Secretary, Mr Chua Kim Seng and Dr Christopher Lam as Assistant Secretaries, Dr Edward Jacob as Treasurer, Dr Peter Garcia-Webb (Australia) as Scientific Sub-Committee Chairperson, Dr Tan It Koon as Exhibition Sub-Committee Chairperson, Dr Chio Lee Foon as Social Sub-Committee Chairperson, Dr Aw Swee Eng as Proceedings Publication Chairperson and Mr Simon Langton (Australia) as Publicity Sub-Committee Chairperson. Professors T P Whitehead (UK) and Kiyoshi Miyai (Japan) were also invited to serve as members of the committee. The Congress was a great success. It provided a substantial income and helped to establish a strong financial base for the SACB. It was so successful that SACB was requested to host the Second Congress. Participants and representatives of national associations from the Asian-Pacific Region were of the opinion that the Regional Congress should be a regular triennial event.  

The SACB played a key role in the initiation of the Asian & Pacific Federation of Clinical Biochemistry (APFCB). During the first congress, clinical biochemists from 16 countries discussed the proposal for the establishment of an Asian Pacific Federation of Clinical Biochemistry (APFCB). A Steering Committee was formed with the responsibility to prepare a draft constitution for the APFCB for presentation at the second congress in 1982.  

Dr Tan It Koon was the Singapore representative on the Steering Committee. It was decided that the name of future congresses should be known as Asian-Pacific Congress of Clinical Biochemistry to include all countries in Asia rather than just South East Asia. Dr Tan It Koon continued to serve as the chairman for the 2nd Asian-Pacific Congress of Clinical Biochemistry scheduled for 19-24 September 1982 at the Mandarin Hotel. Other members of the organising committee were: Dr Edward Jacob (Secretary), Ms Agnes Kua (Assistant Secretary), Mr Chua Kim Seng (Treasurer), Mr Leong Chan Kay (Assistant Treasurer), Dr Aw Swee Eng and Dr Peter Garcia-Webb (Scientific Sub-Committee), Mr Ow Ah Kit and Dr Gunasegaram (Exhibition Sub-Committee), Dr Chio Lee Foon (Publicity), Dr Yo Sui Lan (Social), Mr Simon Langton (Daily News). Subsequently, Dr Yo became the Secretary of SACB and served for a long period from 1983 until 1999. The 2nd Asian-Pacific Congress of Clinical Biochemistry was again a great success.  

During this Congress, the Constitution for the APFCB was adopted and the APFCB was formally established with Membership of 5 national associations: Australia, India, Indonesia, Japan and Singapore. Dr Tan It Koon was elected President for the first two terms of 6 years. Dr Tan had the APFCB registered as a society with the Registry of Societies and started a bank account for the Federation in Singapore. Dr Tan continued to contribute actively to the work of APFCB until the time of writing of this report. Thus, he was President for the period 1982 - 1988, Immediate-Past President for 1988 - 1991, Secretary for 1991 - 1994, President for 1994 - 1998 and Immediate-Past President for 1998 - 2001. He initiated the publication of the APFCB newsletter (APFCB News) and has since been serving as the chief editor of the annual publication. Five to six thousand copies of the self-supporting newsletter are printed each time and distributed free of charge to Member Associations. 

Besides the first two major congresses of clinical biochemistry, Council Members of SACB have been active in serving as key members of the organising committees for various related congresses. They helped to initiate the first three of the following congresses:  
* 1st Asian & Pacific Chemistry Congress (1981)  
* 1st Asian-Pacific Congress on Legal Medicine & Forensic Sciences (1983)  
* 1st Asian-Pacific Congress of Medical Virology (1988) 
* 4th Congress of the Federation of Asian & Oceanian Biochemists (1986)  
* 3rd International Union of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology Conference on Molecular Recognition (1995)  
* 13th International Conference on Human Tumor Markers (Organised jointly with The International Academy of Tumor Marker Oncology in1996)  
* Joint Scientific Meeting of the Royal College of Pathologists of Australasia, the Chapter of Pathologists (Academy of Medicine, Singapore), Singapore Society of Pathology and Malaysian Society of Pathologists (1997)  
* APASL Commemorative International Congress on Viral Hepatitis, Prevention and Control (2000)  

Annually, SACB has been actively organising scientific lectures and symposiums to update members in the field. Deserving members have been given grants to present papers at various regional and international congresses.  

A 6-month educational programme consisting of 56-lecture courses on various aspects of clinical biochemistry was conducted in 1997.  

Five major scientific meetings involving a number of sponsored speakers from overseas were held:  
?nbsp; 10th Anniversary Scientific Meeting in March 1988  
?nbsp; Joint Symposium with the North American Chinese Clinical Chemists Association on Frontiers of Clinical Laboratory Science in 1991 
?Joint Scientific Meeting with the Singapore Society of Pathology and Malaysian Society of Pathologists in 1992  
?Joint Scientific Meeting with the Association of Clinical Biochemists, UK , in 1993  
?20th Anniversary Scientific Meeting on Emerging Patterns in Laboratory Practice in March 1998.  

I hope that the SACB will grow from strength to strength and continue to play a prominent role in advancing the practice of laboratory medicine as well as improvement of patient care not only in Singapore but the Asian-Pacific Region.  

Dr Tan It Koon Founding President & President SACB  
1978-1998  
29 April 2000