Faculty Bios

Learn more about the expert speakers participating in AST's online education activities. You may view an individual's conflict of interest disclosure by clicking on the link in his/her section, or by visiting the conflict of interest disclosure home page.


Independent Living Donor Advocate Webinar Series 2015

Robert Brown, MD, MPH • Columbia University Medical Center

Robert S. Brown, Jr., MD, MPH is the Frank Cardile Professor of Medicine and Medical Director of the Transplantation Initiative at Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons in New York, New York. He also holds appointments in the Departments of Surgery and Pediatrics at Columbia and the Department of Medicine at Weill Cornell School of Medicine. Dr. Brown, Jr. is the Director of the Center for Liver Disease and Transplantation at New York Presbyterian Hospital in New York, New York.

Dr. Brown, Jr. received his medical degree from New York University and his Master of Public Health from the Graduate School of Public Health, University of California in Berkeley. Following the completion of his medical degree, he fulfilled his internship in Medicine at Beth Israel Hospital in Boston and his fellowship in gastroenterology and hepatology at the University of California in San Francisco.

A fellow of the American College of Physicians, the American Gastroenterological Association and the American College of Gastroenterology, Dr. Brown, Jr. is also a member of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, the European Association for the Study of the Liver, and the American Society for Transplantation. He is board certified in Internal Medicine, Gastroenterology, and Transplant Hepatology.

Dr. Brown, Jr. has co-authored over 100 peer-reviewed articles most dedicated to viral hepatitis and liver transplantation and has extensive research funding in those areas. He is an Associate Editor for Liver Transplantation and a prior Associate Editor for Gastroenterology and Hepatology News and Hepatology. He was awarded the Young Investigator Award from the American Society of Transplant Physicians in 1996, received the Senior Attending Teacher Award from New York Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center in 2009, and was the American Liver Foundation New York Chapter’s Physician of the Year in 2010.

Presenting: Basics of Liver Disease and Transplantation on July 29, 2015

Matt Cooper, MD • Medstar Georgetown Transplant Institute


Matthew Cooper is a Professor of Surgery at Georgetown SOM and the Director of Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation at the Medstar Georgetown Transplant Institute (MGTI), Surgical Director for the Pediatric Kidney Transplant program at Children’s National Medical Center and the Medical Director for the MGUH Perioperative Services.

After receiving his medical degree from the Georgetown University School of Medicine in 1994, Dr Cooper completed his general surgery training at the Medical College of Wisconsin followed by a fellowship in multi-organ abdominal transplantation in 2002 at the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD. He joined the transplant faculty at the Johns Hopkins Hospital upon completion of his training, and was appointed Surgical Director of Kidney Transplantation and Clinical Research in 2003. Dr. Cooper joined the University of Maryland in 2005 directing the kidney transplant and clinical research program until 2012 when he assumed his current role in Washington, DC.

Dr. Cooper trained with the pioneers of the laparoscopic donor nephrectomy, regularly performs these procedures and seeks new opportunities for living donation by removing the disincentives for those considering donation while promoting the safety and long-term care of live organ donors. Dr. Cooper is involved in several ongoing clinical research projects primarily with an interest in immunosuppression minimization and amelioration of delayed graft function in kidney allografts following ischemic reperfusion injury. He has authored over 100 peer-reviewed manuscripts and 6 book chapters.

Dr. Cooper is involved in transplantation activities both locally in the District and on a national basis. He is a member of the Board of Directors for the NKF and a member of the NKF’s national TransplantTask Force, Public Policy Committee and Living Donor Executive Committee. He was elected to the National Board of Directors for the NKF. He recently served as the chairman of the United Network of Organ Sharing’s (UNOS) Living Donor Committee and currently sits on UNOS’ Board of Directors as well as the Boards for the American Foundation for Donation and Transplantation and the local OPO – Washington Regional Transplant Community. Dr. Cooper is the ASTS representative to the ATC Planning Committee and is a member of the AST Living Donor Community of Practice. 

Presenting: Living Kidney Donation A to Z: Understanding the Basics on July 15, 2015
 

Jami Hanneman, MSW, LCSW • University of Wisconsin

Jami Hanneman is the living donor social worker and Independent Living Donor Advocate at Northwestern Medicine and Kovler Organ Transplant Center, where she has worked since 2008. She is very involved with the Chicago Transplant Ethics Consortium (CTEC) where she has co-authored multiple articles on various subjects relating to living donor ethics. Ms. Hanneman received a Master of Social Work at Loyola University Chicago. She trained at Rush University Medical Center and Kindred Behavioral Health. Presenting: Navigating the ILDA Role: Challenges and Responsibilities on October 21, 2015
 

Rebecca Hays, MSW • University of Wisconsin

Rebecca Hays is the living donor social worker and Independent Living Donor Advocate at University of Wisconsin Hospital and Clinics, where she has worked at the transplant clinic since 2002. She is chair of the American Society for Transplantation Living Donor Community of Practice, and recently co-chaired a Joint Societies Consensus Conference on Living Donation. She writes and speaks frequently on living donor informed consent, readiness, and engagement, including a Guidance Document for the ILDA Role in AJT. She trained at UC-Berkeley and Johns Hopkins. Presenting: Basics of Informed Consent for Living Donors on September 16, 2015
 

Cheryl Jacobs, MSW, LICSW • University of Minnesota

Cheryl Jacobs has been a clinical transplant social worker for living donors at the University of Minnesota-Medical Center for 23 years and currently, conducts psychosocial research on living kidney donors. She was instrumental in developing the psychosocial criteria used at their Living Donor Program for all solid organ donors (kidney, liver, lung, pancreas, and intestine) and for their Nondirected Kidney Donation Program, which was the first in the U.S. in 1999. Beyond providing clinical and advocacy services at her institution and State level, she created a living donor assistance fund in 2000 to assist donors at her program. Over the years, she has presented extensively at numerous national transplant conferences, and has conducted research and published on a variety of topics related to the psychosocial and financial impacts of living donation.

She has served on various National Committees and Consensus Conference Groups to develop Psychosocial Guidelines and practices for living donors as they’ve evolved over time. In addition to being a previous board member on the UNOS Living Donor Committee, she currently serves on the AST’s Executive Committee for the Psychosocial Community of Practice. Her current focus is studying their center’s nondirected-paired exchange donors.
 

Presenting: Difficult Donor Decisions on December 16, 2015

Benjamin Hippen, MD, FASN, FAST • Metrolina Nephrology Associates, P.A.
 

Benjamin Hippen, MD is a nephrologist specializing in transplantation at Metrolina Nephrology Associates, P.A., a 30-nephrologist practice based in the greater Charlotte area. He is a Fellow of the American Society of Nephrology and a Fellow of the American Society of Transplantation, a member of the Board of Directors and the Medical Review Board for ESRD Network 6, and a past member of the Ethics Committee and Membership and Professional Standards Committee of the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network. The author of more than 40 articles, review and book chapters, his areas of research interest include ethical and public policy issues in renal transplantation and living donation. Dr. Hippen is a former associate editor of the American Journal of Transplantation, and is on the editorial board of the Journal of Medicine and Philosophy. Presenting: Medical Ethics: Concepts and ILDA Practice on November 18, 2015
 

Dianne LaPointe Rudow, ANP-BC, DNP, CCTC • Mount Sinai Hospital


 

I am a doctorally prepared nurse practitioner who went to Hunter-Bellevue School of Nursing and received a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. I furthered my studies and received a Master of Science in Nursing and became a Nurse Practitioner. I was one of the first individuals in the United States to graduate with a Doctorate of Nursing Practice (DNP) from Columbia University in 2005. I joined the Mount Sinai Team in April 2010 after a career at Columbia University Medical Center where I started the Liver Transplant Program in 1998. I developed their living donor advocacy team to evaluate and manage living liver donors. When I joined RMTI in April 2010 it was to develop and direct The Center for Living Donation where I expanded my vision to encompass comprehensive care for liver and kidney donors, making it the first of its kind to provide innovativeexpertise in the medical, surgical, and psychological health before and after living donation. I have published and presented on live donor advocacy both nationally and internationally. Additionally I have served on many boards, consensus conferences and committees on transplantation. My research focus has been on care of the live organ donor. Many studies have been conducted on medical outcomes of the live donor but the psychosocial factors influencing donors to donate and affecting them post donation have been under studied. I have looked at quality of life, comparisons of experiences of liver and kidney donors, and resilience and personality traits in donors. My most recent endeavor is to develop a live donor psychosocial assessment tool (LDAT) to incorporate into the live donor psychosocial evaluation. Objectively assessing donors will assist clinicians in appropriately caring for donors before and after donation.
 
Presenting: History of ILDA Role including regulatory oversight and policy, basics of ILDA role on May 27, 2015
 
Elizabeth Pomfret, MD, PhD • Lahey Hospital and Medical Center

Elizabeth A. Pomfret, MD, PhD is the Chair of the Department of Transplantation and Hepatobiliary Diseases at the Lahey Clinic Medical Center in Burlington, Massachusetts and is Professor of Surgery at Tufts University School of Medicine in Boston. Dr. Pomfret is an established multi-organ transplant surgeon with additional surgical training in Live Donor Liver Transplantation. She is currently the President of the International Liver Transplantation Society (ILTS). She has served as an American Society of Transplant Surgeons (ASTS) Councilor from 2009-2012. Dr Pomfret is the former Chair of the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) Liver and Intestine Transplantation Committee, has served on the UNOS Membership and Professional Standards Committee (MPSC) and currently serves on the UNOS Board of Directors and the UNOS Corporate Affairs Committee.

Dr. Pomfret is an active researcher with a record of peer-reviewed publications and has lectured worldwide on current issues in the field.
Presenting: Living Liver Donation A to Z: Understadning the Basics on August 19, 2015

David Serur, MD • NYP-Weill Cornell and Rogosin Institute
 

Dr. Serur came to Cornell in 1991 with an interest in clinical transplantation and is now Medical Director of the kidney transplant program. Research interests have included pharmaceutical industry supported studies of new transplant medications as well as investigator-initiated studies. Dr. Serur was one of the earliest proponents of offering kidney transplantation to HIV patients on dialysis, something that many thought was too risky but is now routinely done. He serves on the editorial board of the journal Transplantation and is on the medical boards of the NY Organ Donor Network and the Manhattan chapter of TRIO, the transplant recipient organization. Being involved in kidney paired exchange since its inception at Cornell, Dr. Serur has volunteered as Medical Director of the National Kidney Registry, the largest paired exchange program in the world. Presenting: Basics of Kidney Disease and Transplantation on June 17, 2015
 

Ellen Shukhman, RN-BC, BSN, CCTC • Cedars Sinai Comprehensive Transplant Center


 

I am a dedicated Registered Nurse with over 25 years of clinical experience, with comprehensive knowledge and expertise in Living Kidney Donation. As the lead in the Kidney Living Donor Transplant Program, I am instrumental in the development and evolution of the living donor evaluation process, program policies and guidelines. I spearheaded the implementation of the CSMC Kidney Paired Donation Program, and facilitated Cedars-Sinai’s first Highly Sensitized Internal Paired Donation Chain and Blood Incompatible / Highly Sensitized External Paired Donation. I pride myself on providing quality, compassionate, and committed patient-centered care and education to living kidney donors, adult / pediatric solid organ transplant patients, and their family / caregivers. I am a driven and goal oriented healthcare professional with solid experience advancing and supporting operations in medical healthcare environments. I am a Cedars-Sinai 2013 President’s Award Winner, Recipient of a Safety Star of the Week, Multiple Care Share Awards and Standing Ovations in recognition of excellence and quality patient care. Presenting: Difficult Donor Decisions on December 16, 2015

 

Timely Topics in Transplantation Webinar Series 2014-2015

Gena Boyle, MPA • UNOS

Gena Boyle is a Policy Manager in the UNOS Policy Department. She is also the Liaison to the OPTN Kidney Transplantation Committee. She has served in this role since 2012. Gena received her MPA degree from Virginia Tech. Prior to joining UNOS, she spent four years as a health policy advisor to Virginia Governor Tim Kaine. 

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Presenting: Kidney Allocation System Changes: Strategies to Improve Recipient Readiness and Reduce Disparities on 11/4/14

Kimberly Brown, MD • Henry Ford Hospital 

Dr. Kimberly A. Brown is the Chief of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit. She joined the Henry Ford Medical Group in 1995 as medical director of the liver transplant program and was appointed Chief of the division of gastroenterology and hepatology in 2003. In addition, she served as the program director for the GI fellowship program from 2003 to 2008.

Dr Brown received her undergraduate degree from the University of Michigan in 1981. She completed her medical degree at Wayne State University in 1985. Dr Brown completed both her residency in internal medicine as well as her fellowship in gastroenterology at the University of Michigan in 1992 and was named chief medical resident in 1984-85.

As Chief of Gastroenterology and Hepatology and past medical director of liver transplantation, Dr Brown sees and manages patients with complex liver disease both before and after liver transplantation. In conjunction with Dr Abouljoud, she worked to develop the leading liver transplant program in the State of Michigan. As fellowship director, she managed a fellowship program of 12 GI/liver fellows and continues to be involved in structuring and monitoring their education and academic success. She has published over 40 articles, 80 abstracts and 8 book chapters/reviews and is a very active clinical investigator in viral hepatitis, advanced liver disease and post liver transplant management.

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Presenting: Update on Hepatitis C Eradication Including Renal Clearance and Dosing and Important DDI Highlights on 5/19/15

Lara Danziger-Isakov, MD, MPH • Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center

Lara Danziger-Isakov, MD, MPH, practices pediatric infectious diseases at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center where she is Associate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Cincinnati. Dr. Danziger-Isakov earned her MD at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and complete her residency in Pediatrics at the Cleveland Clinic. She also completed a fellowship in Pediatric Infectious Diseases at Saint Louis Children's Hospital. Dr. Danziger-Isakov is board-certified in Pediatrics and Pediatric Infectious Diseases by the American Board of Pediatrics. Her clinical interests include pediatric infectious diseases, infections in transplant recipients, and infections in immunocompromised patients. Her research interests include outcomes related to infection after pediatric transplantation with an emphasis on pediatric and adult lung transplantation. In addition, Dr. Danziger-Isakov participates in clinical trials to evaluate both new infectious disease therapies and new method of detection for infectious diseases.

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Presenting: Vaccine Updates in SOT: What's New, What's Standard of Care? on 11/18/14

Richard Formica, MD • Yale University

Richard Formica, M.D. chairs the OPTN/UNOS Kidney Transplantation Committee. Dr. Formica is an Associate Professor of Medicine and Surgery at Yale University School of Medicine and is the Medical Director of kidney and pancreas transplantation at Yale-New Haven Hospital. He earned his medical degree at Boston University School of Medicine. Dr. Formica is board certified in both nephrology and internal medicine.

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Presenting: Kidney Allocation System Changes: Strategies to Improve Recipient Readiness and Reduce Disparities on 11/4/14

John Friedewald, MD • Northwestern Medicine

John J. Friedewald, MD, is a transplant nephrologist on the medical staff at Northwestern Memorial Hospital and an associate professor of Medicine and Surgery at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. After earning an undergraduate degree in psychology from Princeton University and a medical degree from Columbia University College of Physicians and Surgeons, Dr. Friedewald completed his residency in Internal Medicine and fellowship training in Nephrology both at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore.

Dr. Friedewald’s clinical interests include innovative methods to expand live donor kidney transplantation such as kidney paired donation and incompatible transplants. In 2013 he completed a two-year term as chair of the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) Kidney Committee during which time he led the effort to substantially revise the national kidney allocation policy for the first time in several decades. He has also chaired the UNOS Committee for Kidney Paired Donation, charged with creating a unified, national kidney paired donation system.

Dr. Friedewald is the director of Clinical Research for the Comprehensive Transplant Center at Feinberg. His funded research activities include studies looking to advance the non-invasive diagnosis of rejection using proteogenomic biomarkers, to study the genetic basis for transplant outcomes, and to improve detection and treatment of chronic antibody-mediated rejection.

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Presenting: Multiorgan Transplantation: One Organ Too Many? on 2/10/15

Elisa Gordon, PhD, MPH • Northwestern University

Dr. Gordon is Associate Professor in the Center for Healthcare Studies and Comprehensive Transplant Center at the Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, Chicago, Illinois. Dr. Gordon trained as a medical anthropologist at Case Western Reserve University and as a clinical ethicist at the University of Chicago. She received her Master’s degree in public health at University of Illinois at Chicago with an emphasis on community health. Dr. Gordon conducts mixed-methods research on informed consent and other ethical issues pertaining to kidney transplantation and living donation, with funding support from then-HCFA, HRSA, NIDDK, NIAID, and NINR. She serves as the Vice Chair of the UNOS Ethics Committee, on the Editorial Board of the American Journal of Transplantation, and as Treasurer of the American Society for Bioethics and Humanities. She has over 70 peer-reviewed publications on ethical issues in organ transplantation, human subjects research ethics, and self-care management.

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Presenting: Medically Complex Living Donors: Candidacy, Care, and Informed Consent on 2/17/15

Peter Heeger, MD •  Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

Peter S. Heeger, MD is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine (1984). He completed medical residency training along with a Chief Medical Resident year at Temple University Hospital in Philadelphia (1984-1988) and then clinical and research Nephrology training at the University of Pennsylvania (1988-93). After developing a research interest in transplantation in Cleveland OH (Case Western and the Cleveland Clinic), Dr. Heeger moved to the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (NY) where he is currently the Irene and Arthur Fishberg Professor of Medicine and Director of the Translational Transplant Research Center. Dr. Heeger has been continuously funded through the National Institutes of Health for 19 years for studies in transplantation immunobiology. He currently leads an NIH consortium, Clinical Trials in Organ Transplantation, which is conducting multiple international trials to assess the utility of noninvasive biomarkers to predict outcomes and guide treatment strategies in transplant recipients. Dr. Heeger’s basic science research interests are in mechanisms of allograft injury and tolerance, with a specific focus on interactions between the complement system and T lymphocytes. Dr. Heeger is the author of > 140 publications. He currently is a member of the TTT NIH study section for grant reviews, is an associate editor and reviewer for multiple immunology, transplant and nephrology journals (including J Clin Invest and Am J Transplantation), and is the 2011 recipient of the Established Investigator Award from the American Society of Transplantation.

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Presenting: Monitoring the Alloresponse Before and After Transplantation on 3/31/15

Atul Humar, MD • University Health Network-University of Toronto

Atul Humar is a Professor in the Department of Medicine, University of Toronto. Dr. Humar received his medical degree from the University of Ottawa. He completed his residency and did further training in Transplant Infectious Diseases in Toronto and Boston. Dr. Humar’s research interests are in virology with a focus on the pathogenesis of herpesvirus infections post-transplant. He is involved in both basic and clinical research assessing immunologic and virologic determinants of infection. Dr. Humar is the Director of Multi Organ Transplant Program at the University Health Network and the University of Toronto Transplant Institute. He is also active in the Canadian Society of Transplantation as a Vice-President and has been very active in both the AST and TTS.

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Presenting: Cytomegalovirus: Prevention, Therapy, Immunity on 4/21/15

Tiffany Kaiser, PharmD • University of Cincinnati 

Dr. Tiffany Kaiser is an associate professor of medicine in the Division of Digestive Diseases at The University of Cincinnati (UC), practicing as a transplant clinical pharmacist at UC Medical Center. She is an assistant adjunct professor at the College of Pharmacy and an assistant director of the PGY2 transplant specialty residency in Cincinnati. She received her Pharm.D. degree from The Ohio State University and completed a pharmacy practice residency at the University of Illinois at Chicago and a specialty residency in solid-organ transplantation at UC. She is a board-certified pharmacotherapy specialist and a fellow of the American College of Clinical Pharmacy (ACCP). She has served as primary or co investigator on multiple industry or NIH sponsored clinical trials. She is involved in pharmacy, liver, and transplant organizations and has previously served as chair of ACCP’s Immunology/Transplantation practice based network. She has presented nationally and published many articles in the areas of liver disease and transplantation.

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Presenting: Update on Hepatitis C Eradication Including Renal Clearance and Dosing and Important DDI Highlights on 5/19/15

Jon Kobashigawa, MD • Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute

Jon Kobashigawa, MD is Associate Director of the Cedars-Sinai Heart Institute, Director of Advanced Heart Disease Section and Director of the Heart Transplant Program at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center.

He holds the DSL/Thomas D. Gordon Chair in Heart Transplantation Medicine. He received his undergraduate degree at Stanford University and earned his medical degree at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York. He is a Past President of the International Society of Heart and Lung Transplantation.

Dr. Kobashigawa is recognized nationally and internationally as a leader in the heart transplantation field. He has published over 250 peer reviewed articles, chapters and monographs in the field of heart failure and transplantation and has chaired several multi-center studies. Dr Kobashigawa has organized and chaired several International Consensus Conferences to discuss pertinent questions in the field of heart failure and heart transplant. He lectures at universities around the world and mentors young physicians who have ascended to important academic positions throughout the country.

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Presenting: Treatment of Antibody-mediated Rejection in Thoracic transplants: Role of desensitization, histopathological diagnosis and management strategies of different types of AMR on 1/20/15

Camille Kotton, MD • Massachusetts General Hospital

Camille Nelson Kotton MD is the clinical director of the Transplant Infectious Disease and Compromised Host Program at the Massachusetts General Hospital, and Associate Professor of Medicine, Harvard Medical School, Boston, Massachusetts. She also leads the outpatient Transplant Infectious Disease Clinic. She is the current co-chair of The Infectious Disease Community of Practice of The American Society of Transplantation. She serves on The Disease Transmission Advisory Committee for The United Network Organ Sharing, The Advisory Committee on Blood and Tissue Safety and Availability, and is a contributing member for World Health Organization (WHO) Project NOTIFY (Donor Derived Infections). From 2007-2013 she was the president of The Transplant Infectious Disease Section of The Transplantation Society. Highlights of her time as president include the development of international guidelines on CMV management after solid organ transplant, followed by an updated version, published in Transplantation (2010 and 2013). She has also organized and contributed significantly to a meeting on management of tuberculosis issues in organ donors, recently published in the American Journal of Transplantation. In addition, she organized and led five international Transplant Infectious Disease meetings (Vancouver, 2010; Glasgow, 2011; Berlin, 2012; Vienna, 2013; Barcelona, 2014), and organized an international group of experts on the topic of transplant infectious disease in composite tissue allografts, for which they are actively developing guidelines for clinical management. Her clinical interests include cytomegalovirus, donor-derived infections, zoonoses, and travel and tropical medicine in the transplant setting.

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Presenting: Cytomegalovirus: Prevention, Therapy, Immunity on 4/21

Deepali Kumar, MD, MSc, FRCPC • University Health Network

Dr. Deepali Kumar is Associate Professor of Medicine, University of Toronto and Active Staff at the University Health Network in the Transplant Infectious Diseases program. Her clinical and research interests focus on infections in the immunocompromised host and include vaccine-preventable diseases as well as the epidemiology of emerging infections in transplantation in solid organ and stem cell transplantation. She is Past-Chair of the American Society of Transplantation (AST)-Infectious Diseases Community of Practice and Associate Editor of the 3rd Edition of the AST ID Guidelines. She also is member of the Canadian National Advisory Committee on Immunization and Canadian Standards’ Association technical committee for Tissue and Organ transplantation.

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Presenting: Vaccine Updates in SOT: What's New, What's Standard of Care? on 1/18/14

Matt Morrell, MD • University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine 

Matthew Morrell graduated summa cum laude from the University of Utah with a bachelor of science in chemistry. Afterwards, he attended the University of California in Los Angeles School of Medicine where he received his Doctor of Medicine degree and was elected to the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor Society. He then completed both his residency in internal medicine and fellowship in pulmonary and critical care at Washington University in St. Louis/Barnes-Jewish Hospital. During this time he was awarded the Shatz-Strauss Teaching Award and the Washington University School of Medicine Resident of the Year Award. In July 2009, he joined the faculty of the Division of Pulmonary, Allergy and Critical Care Medicine at the University of Pittsburgh as an Assistant Professor.

Dr. Morrell’s main clinical interests are concentrated on the care of pulmonary transplant recipients and patients with end-stage lung disease. Dr. Morrell’s clinical research interests have included the risk factors for the development of chronic lung allograft dysfunction.

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Presenting: Treatment of Antibody-mediated Rejection in Thoracic transplants: Role of desensitization, histopathological diagnosis and management strategies of different types of AMR on 1/20/15

Thomas Mueller, MD, PhD • University Hospital Zurich

Biography unavailable. Presenting World Transplant Congress 2014: Clinical Highlights on 10/21/14

Christian Oberkofler, MD • University Hospital Zurich

After college at the Medical University Innsbruck (Austria) and promotion in Bologna (Italy), Dr. Oberkofler completed his surgical training at the University Hospital Zurich (Switzerland), including rotations in Wil (SG, Switzerland) and Muri (AG, Switzerland). As part of the academic training he spent 2.5 years in the laboratory under the direction of Prof. Pierre-Alain Clavien and examined new experimental approaches to mitigate the effects of ischemia-reperfusion injury to abdominal organs. Since July 2014 he is a staff physician at the department of visceral- and transplantation surgery of the University Hospital Zurich and is dedicated clinically and experimentally to transplant and vascular access surgery.

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Presenting: World Transplant Congress 2014: Clinical Highlights on 10/21/14

Raymund Razonable, MD • Mayo Clinic

Raymund R. Razonable, MD, is Professor of Medicine at the College of Medicine at Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota. He serves as the Director of Transplant Infectious Disease Program, Associate Chair for Faculty Development, Program Director of the Transplant ID Fellowship Program, and Associate Program Director of the Infectious Disease Fellowship Program in the Division of Infectious Diseases at the Mayo Clinic.

Dr Razonable’s clinical interests include infections in immunocompromised hosts. His research addresses immunovirology and transplant infections, with specific interest in cytomegalovirus infections. He has authored more than 150 peer-reviewed original and review articles, more than 30 book chapters, and more than 140 abstracts on these topics. He has been a sought-after speaker at regional, national, and international meetings. Dr Razonable is an editor of the journal Transplant Infectious Diseases, and serves on the editorial boards of several journals.

A recipient of many awards and honors throughout his career, Dr Razonable was inducted as a Fellow of the Infectious Diseases Society of America in 2011. He is a member of several other professional societies, including the American Medical Association, American Society for Microbiology, American Society of Transplantation (AST), AST Infectious Disease Community of Practice, the Immunocompromised Host Society, and the Transplantation Society.

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Presenting: Cytomegalovirus: Prevention, Therapy, Immunity on 4/21/15

Peter Reese, MD, MSCE

Peter P. Reese, MD MSCE is a transplant nephrologist at the Penn Transplant Institute and Assistant Professor of Medicine and Epidemiology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. After earning an undergraduate degree at Princeton in anthropology and a medical degree at Johns Hopkins, Dr. Reese completed residency and a chief residency year in internal medicine at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston. He then completed renal fellowship and transplant subspecialty training at Penn.

Dr. Reese's primary research focus is the development of effective strategies to increase access to kidney transplantation. He uses tools from epidemiology, biostatistics, and medical ethics to describe disparities in transplantation and methods to overcome them. His research portfolio also includes the development of effective strategies to improve health behaviors such as medication adherence. Through the United Network for Organ Sharing, where he serves as chair of the Ethics Committee, he helps to translate clinical research into effective national policy.

In the last five years, Dr. Reese’s research efforts have been supported by grants from the NIH, the Greenwall Foundation and the American Society of Transplantation. In recognition of his contributions to transplant research, he received a 2011 Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers.

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Presenting: Multiorgan Transplantation: One Organ Too Many? on 2/10/15

David Serur, MD • New York Presbyterian Weill Cornell

Dr. Serur came to Cornell in 1991 with an interest in clinical transplantation and is now Medical Director of the kidney transplant program. Research interests have included pharmaceutical industry supported studies of new transplant medications as well as investigator-initiated studies. Dr. Serur was one of the earliest proponents of offering kidney transplantation to HIV patients on dialysis, something that many thought was too risky but is now routinely done. He serves on the editorial board of the journal Transplantation and is on the medical boards of the NY Organ Donor Network and the Manhattan chapter of TRIO, the transplant recipient organization. Being involved in kidney paired exchange since its inception at Cornell, Dr. Serur has volunteered as Medical Director of the National Kidney Registry, the largest paired exchange program in the world.

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Presenting: Medically Complex Living Donors: Candidacy, Care, and Informed Consent on 2/17/15

Norah Terrault, MD, MPH  University of California, San Francisco

Dr. Norah Terrault is the Professor of Medicine and Surgery and the Director of the Viral Hepatitis Center at the University of California San Francisco.

She is recognized nationally and internationally for her work related to viral hepatitis, especially in the setting of liver transplantation. She has authored over 120 original articles, reviews and book chapters on the epidemiology, natural history and management of chronic liver diseases. She serves on the AASLD Governing Board and is the Deputy Editor for Liver Transplantation and Associate Editor for Hepatology. She is an investigator on several NIH-funded clinical studies in hepatitis B and C, and is an investigator on several ongoing clinical trials of antiviral therapies for patients with chronic hepatitis B and C.

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Presenting: Hepatitis C Treatment in Non-liver Solid Organ Transplant Recipients on 3/17/15

 

Business of Transplantation Webinar Series 2014

Kevin Myer, MSHA • LifeGift

With more than 25 years of experience in health care leadership, specifically in organ donation and transplantation, Kevin A. Myer, MSHA, took the reins of president and CEO of LifeGift in January, 2013.

Myer joined LifeGift from the United Network of Organ Sharing (UNOS), where he served as the business director for the organization’s Center for Transplant System Excellence. In this role, Myer led efforts to improve the organ transplantation system through multiple funded research projects using non-traditional approaches and collaborative research teams. Previously, Myer was the assistant director for the UNOS Department of Evaluation and Quality, where he oversaw policy compliance auditing, organ allocation analysis and led special projects in patient safety. Before his tenure at UNOS, Myer held the positions of executive director and vice president of LifeNet Health, an organ procurement organization (OPO) and biomedical implant agency based in Virginia.

Myer received his Bachelor of Science degree from Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y. and earned his Master of Science in health administration degree from the Medical College of Virginia/Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, Va. He also completed a fellowship in patient safety at Virginia Commonwealth University.

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Presenting: OPO and Transplant Center Collaborations on 9/10/14

William Vaughan • Guidry & East

William Vaughan is a nationally recognized consultant in organ transplant operations, and he has extensive experience in Medicare reimbursement. He was employed for 11 years by Aetna Life and Casualty Insurance in Hartford, Connecticut (a Medicare Intermediary). During that time, he served as an administrator of Medicare Part A field offices and of the Medicare End-Stage Renal Disease Reimbursement Program, concerned with tissue-typing laboratories and independent organ procurement agencies.

In addition, William was Vice President of Reimbursement at LifeLink Foundation, Inc., Tampa. William has worked as a consultant with a number of health care providers in the areas of financial reporting, record keeping and management. He has also helped new health care organizations develop financial and organizational structures.

>View William Vaughan's conflict of interest disclosure

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Presenting: OPO Finance on 10/8/14

Jon Friedman, MD • Optum

Jon Friedman, MD, has been with Optum for 14 years. Seven years as PacifiCare’s Medical Director of their National Preferred Transplant Network (prior to the merger with UnitedHealth Group), six years with Optum as the National Medical Director of Transplants and Congenital Heart Disease, and the last year as Chief Medical Officer for Optum’s Complex Medical Conditions programs.

Prior to joining PacifiCare in 2000, Dr. Friedman spent 10 years in practice with HealthCare Partners Medical Group in Los Angeles, where he had oversight of Utilization Management and Quality Improvement for their Los Angeles Region.

Dr. Friedman holds a BA in Biochemistry from the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA; an MD from Washington University Medical School in St. Louis; and a Fellowship in Geriatric Medicine from UCLA, Los Angeles. He is Board Certified in both Internal Medicine and Geriatric Medicine. Dr. Friedman is a member of the American Society of Transplantation.

>View Jon Friedman's conflict of interest disclosure

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Presenting: Changes in the Healthcare Environment and Transplantation on 11/12/14

Thomas Hamilton, MA • Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services

Since 2003 Thomas E. Hamilton has served as the Director of the Survey and Certification Group within the U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). He directs the work of 7000 surveyors at the State and federal levels who perform quality of care inspections for more than 100,000 providers that participate in the Medicare or Medicaid programs, or that provide laboratory services under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (CLIA).

From 1999-2003 Mr. Hamilton served as the Director of CMS’ Disabled and Elderly Health Programs Group. In that capacity he was responsible for Medicaid policy and programs for low income elderly and adults with a disability

For 21 years prior to joining CMS Mr. Hamilton was one of the principal architects of the Wisconsin system of health and long-term care (LTC).

A native of Massachusetts, Mr. Hamilton received a bachelor’s degree in 1973 from Brandeis University in Waltham, MA before conducting graduate studies at the University of Wisconsin.

>View Thomas Hamilton's conflict of interest disclosure

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Presenting: Changes in the Healthcare Environment and Transplantation on 11/12/14
Patricia Martin, RN, BSN • WellPoint, Inc.

Pat Martin, RN, BSN, joined WellPoint, Inc in May 2003 as a Clinical Research Coordinator in the Corporate Medical Policy Project Management Office. In that role, Pat helped the department to identify, develop, implement, and analyze new and emerging technologies for policy development. In May 2005, Pat assumed the role of Director, Specialty Network Management responsible for providing strategic direction for WellPoint’s 14 Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield plan’s transplant network. She has served on subcommittees of both the United Network for Organ Sharing and American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation. Pat has an extensive background in clinical transplantation and nursing administration. She was previously employed with a hospital-based organ procurement organization and transplant center. Pat holds certifications in Medical/Surgical Nursing, Oncology Nursing, Clinical and Procurement Transplantation. 

>View Pat Martin's conflict of interest disclosure

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Presenting: Changes in the Healthcare Environment and Transplantation on 11/12/14

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