About AST

President's Blog

A New Look for the New Year
January 04, 2016 Posted by jallan

James S. Allan, MD, MBA, AST President

Today, the American Society of Transplantation (AST) is proud to announce the roll-out of a new brand image and a new website. This change is not simply cosmetic: it reflects the culmination of a multi-year process to strategically modernize the society's image and to provide advanced functionality to our members' most important interface with our organization.

The American Society of Transplant Physicians was formed in 1982 by a small group from the American Society of Nephrology to represent a growing number of transplant physicians...

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Keeping our "Eye on the Prize"
December 15, 2015 Posted by jallan

Currently, transplantation remains one of the most regulated areas of health care. A variety of groups, from payors to UNOS to CMS, have policies that ostensibly encourage the highest quality of patient care. However, these policies do not always align with each other or with the best interests of patients. I have invited my colleague Dr. Jesse Schold to share his thoughts on the current state of transplantation policies.

Jesse Schold, PhD, AST Board Member

Recently, Dr. Allan blogged about timely and important...

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Thanksgiving
November 19, 2015 Posted by jallan

James S. Allan, MD, MBA, AST President

A few years ago, I had the occasion to give my dad’s eulogy.

In a few brief moments, I had to tell a church full of people why I thought my dad was a great guy. Until then, I had never really thought about the specifics of this. I just knew that he was great and that had been sufficient.

With only a few days to prepare a coherent defense of my dad’s greatness, I settled upon a single theme: generosity.

My dad was generous: with his love, with his knowledge, with his time, and with his money.

He knew that he...

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CEOT 2016: Practice, Policy, and Politics of the Organ Shortage
November 09, 2015 Posted by jallan

In anticipation of CEOT 2016, I have asked Ken Newell to blog about what I think will be the best winter meeting our society has ever planned. I hope to see you and your families there!

Register for CEOT 2016

Kenneth Newell, MD, PhD, AST Past-President and CEOT 2016 Program Planning Co-Chair

Is your career focused on transplantation?

Do you want to better understand the sweeping changes that are impacting your practice today, as well as those that are just around...

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TIRN: Protecting the Future of Transplantation
October 26, 2015 Posted by jallan
The AST launched the Transplantation and Immunology Research Network (TIRN) to expand the scope, reach, funding, and effectiveness of the AST’s research program. I’ve invited Dan Salomon and Anil Chandraker to introduce TIRN’s newest feature: the researcher registry. It is absolutely critical for all of us as AST members to embrace and populate this new registry with our own work and scientific perspectives. As we have seen many times in the past, the transplantation community is strongest when we work together.

Daniel...

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The View from My Roof
September 15, 2015 Posted by jallan

Winter in Boston was rough this year. By mid-February, the snow had drifted above my rooftop. When the last snow melted late in April, it was clear that I had some damage to my roof. I started to pull my ladder from the garage, but my wife stopped me, knowing that my sense of balance was not one of my stronger attributes. She insisted that I call a repairman, saying, “Let someone else go up there...you’ll kill yourself!” What she was really saying was that I should hire someone who either values his safety less or needs money more than I do. I acquiesced and found a roofer who did an...

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The Independent Living Donor Advocate
August 03, 2015 Posted by jallan

Living donation began in 1954 and has become more commonplace in recent years due to laparoscopic techniques that allow donors to recover quickly and spend fewer days in the hospital. Despite these advances, living donation remains a serious decision. To promote safe evaluation and care for living donors, federal regulations require transplant programs to appoint an independent living donor advocate (ILDA) to support these patients. However, many in the transplantation community have questions about what the ILDA role entails and how to operationalize it. To clear up the confusion, I have...

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Geographic Disparity in Liver Transplantation: No Easy Solution
July 14, 2015 Posted by jallan

Many in our community have dedicated significant time, research, and thought to the best way to allocate donor organs fairly to patients across the country. However, geographic factors often introduce undesirable anomalies into our organ allocation system. Considering that some regions are net organ exporters while others are net organ importers, it is understandable how contentious battles over a limited resource can arise.

Dr. David Foley and Dr. James Spivey recently represented the AST at an...

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The White House Addresses Organ Shortage in Regenerative Medicine Conference
June 23, 2015 Posted by jallan

The lack of donor organs remains the principal limitation to the field of transplantation. In 2014, wait-listed patients exceeded donors by almost tenfold. As the field of regenerative medicine advances, bioengineered tissues and organs could one day help close this gap. It’s a positive sign that the White House has expressed interest in supporting research in this area. I have invited my colleague, Jason Wertheim, to share details from a recent conference hosted by the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) addressing this subject.

The White House Addresses Organ... Read More...
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HOPE Act Implementation: Words of Caution
June 08, 2015 Posted by jallan

In keeping with our recent tradition of inviting guest bloggers to comment on current topics of interest, I have invited Dr. Emily Blumberg to educate us on the implementation of the Hope Act. A recent advocacy success of the AST and other organizations, the HOPE Act permits the use of HIV-positive donor organs in transplantation. Like most things, "the devil is in the details," and the implementation of this new policy will be no different.

Dr. Blumberg is a Professor of Medicine at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and a well-known expert in transplant infectious...

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