Todd Camp
Applications Specialist, Clinical – Indica Labs

What sparked your interest in histotechnology and biology? 

Like most people that are in histology, I ended up there mainly by chance. I had intended to be a biology teacher when in college but decided against it after graduating. After spending a few years teaching English overseas, I came back to the US and was looking for something temporary and got hired at Quest Diagnostics as a histotechnician. I soon realized I was good at it and enjoyed it, so, I decided to see where I could take the career. 

How did you first learn about Indica Labs and what led you to join the company in 2024? 

I became aware of Indica early on. I first encountered the company when looking at image analysis for breast markers. My real introduction, however, was when my former boss at Oregon Health & Science University (OHSU) invited me to a meeting he was having with Steven Hashagen (Indica’s founder and CEO). Steven was showing the software and discussing building functionality for molecular pathology labs. 

After OHSU, I left pathology for a few years and was involved in BD and strategy for a molecular diagnostics company. Several of my coworkers there were former Leica employees, mainly on the DP side, and we had lots of conversations about digital pathology and where pathology was heading. I discovered that digital pathology was one of the areas I am most passionate about. That led me back into pathology and to Indica. 

What is your role here at Indica Labs? 

I am a clinical applications specialist. In that role, I get to help labs that are somewhere on the journey to digital pathology understand how HALO AP® can make their job easier and more efficient. I also get to train users, solve problems, and think through how HALO AP® can be used across many different workflows and environments.   

How did your roles at Quest Diagnostics, Oregon Health & Science University, and Cepheid prepare you for your role here at Indica? 

I have been incredibly lucky in my career to have had such diverse work experiences. Between OHSU and Quest, I got to experience working in routine histology, esoteric testing, molecular pathology, spatial biology, and translational work in clinical trials.  

Not only have I had the fortune to work across so many different technologies and scientific areas, I have also worked across most of the verticals that touch pathology. I have worked for a CRO, a reference lab, an AMC, a medical device company, and have overseen relationships with pharma companies. 

With these diverse experiences, it allows me to understand problems our customers are likely to face and how HALO AP® can be used to help drive improvements. 

What led you to obtain an MBA from Oklahoma State University? 

Towards the end of my role at OHSU, I began working extensively with NanoString as a beta site for their GeoMx® Digital Spatial Profiler. Doing that required me to take both a business and lab mindset. It is something I found I enjoyed quite a bit. From there I got a part time internship with the Tech Transfer Office at OHSU. I worked with a lot of scientists that were looking at commercialization and innovation. I had a good grasp of the science and how different technologies would address different challenges, but my understanding of many of the business considerations was not as strong. So, I decided to pursue an MBA to expand my knowledge and become a more rounded professional. 

What do you enjoy most about your role? 

I have worked in so many different areas throughout my career journey. Sometimes it feels like I bounced around too much. It is fun to have them all come together in such a cohesive way.  

What motivates you in the work that you do today? 

I love teaching. I love solving problems. I love learning new things. I am also passionate about digital pathology. Being able to do all these things in my day makes motivation easy. 

What do you appreciate most about working at Indica Labs? 

Outside of the parts of the role that I love and the industry, I really appreciate that people at Indica are very invested in what they are doing. Everyone is friendly and helpful and aims to provide the best product/customer experience.  

I also am very appreciative of the opportunity to continue learning. I have expertise in the pathology aspect and now I get to significantly grow my expertise in the digital aspect, such as IT and coding. As one of my bosses early in my career noted in a review, if I am learning, I am happy. 

How do you spend your time outside of work?  

My life is pretty simple outside of work. I typically spend my time with my wife and three children. I like to try and cook new things when I have time. I probably take the “trying new things” a bit too far, as my kids complain that if they really love a dish, it is a sure sign to them I will never make it again. Also, my two younger children successfully bullied me into learning Karate with them. I think they really wanted me there because they would be higher belts than me and therefore have a few hours a week in which they have seniority. 

What are you most excited about in the field of AI in digital pathology? 

This is really hard to answer. There are so many things I find exciting about AI in digital pathology, such as workflow improvements, simple quantitation, case triage, etc. However, there are two areas that I am most excited about. 

The first area is using DP for CDx development. Digital pathology’s ability to do more complex quantitation of biomarkers, such as cytoplasm vs membrane staining, or analysis of extremely low expression levels will help bring more potentially lifesaving drugs to the market by being able to analyze biomarkers in a way that has been, so far, impossible. 

The second area, which is really a future expansion of the first, is biomarker inference from H&E stains. Once this is more widespread, there will be opportunities to, very quickly, diagnose specific mutations or triage based on likelihood of disease. This could allow patients to get their results much more quickly, reduce costs by not having a large panel of genes analyzed when only one or two is necessary, and help focus molecular labs’ resources on the cases that would benefit most from broad NGS panels.