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Collaborative Grants 
leadership
| New Transplant Initiative to Help Drive Exponential Growth in Patient Care, Research Medicine, Pathology, Pediatrics, Surgery in Joint Effort |
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The multi-year undertaking involving heart, lung, kidney and liver transplants is being led by Jean Emond, M.D., Thomas S. Zimmer Professor of Reconstructive Surgery, a vice chair of the Department of Surgery, and a transplant surgeon here since 1997.
“The goal is to have a full-spectrum center dedicated to transplantation – one at the very leading edge of discovery and delivery of care – a center of excellence for translational research, new creativity in medical and surgical care, and the achievement of ground-breaking outcomes in the world of transplant,” Dr. Emond says.
NYPH already ranks first in the nation in number of total solid organ transplants. Dr. Emond, who performed the first live donor liver transplant in the the United States in 1989, has built one of the largest and most innovative transplant programs in the country at CUMC since joining the faculty 10 years ago. Under his influence, a multidisciplinary model has enhanced CUMC’s strategic approach to transplantation care.
“Our plan is to extend the interdisciplinary approach we’ve built over the past 10 years and apply it across an even greater range of scientific, medical and patient care teams,” says Dr. Emond. “We’re fortunate to have an exceptional community of scholars and clinicians with interests in transplantation and the care of patients with organ failure. Our goal is to leverage their diverse expertise and construct a whole that will magnify the sum of its parts.”
Four departments will form the core of this transplant initiative: Medicine, Pathology, Pediatrics, and Surgery. An influx of recruitment resources will be devoted to increasing the contingent of transplant scientists and clinicians among these four clinical departments. Increasing the depth of translational research in transplant-related areas will enhance collaboration with basic science colleagues. An integrated administrative team culled from the group will harmonize operations with existing department structures. The P&S chairs of medicine, pediatrics, pathology, and
surgery, together with representatives from NYPH/Columbia, Morgan Stanley Children’s Hospital, the P&S Faculty Practice Organization, and the P&S Dean’s Office will serve as a board of directors lending scientific energy and leadership to the new enterprise.
Better positioning Columbia faculty to compete for the larger NIH program project grants, such as clinical consortia grants, SCOR and SPOR awards, which demand integration of multiple disciplines in order to address the specified research problems, is a key incentive. Many research agendas are already in place among our faculty – including novel approaches to the clinical management of patient candidates for transplantation; management of organ donors and preservation of organs, and clinical immunologic research.
Clinical transplant faculty already have extramural funding for the study of surgical advances, and many aspects of recipient medical care. Nonetheless, these programs need to be expanded to address the biology of ischemia and reperfusion, aloimmune responses to the donor organs, including T cell functions and tolerance, B cell contributions to graft injury, and novel immunotherapy and monitoring. By coming together, CUMC and NYPH/Columbia will be better positioned to address issues in research ethics and public policy, cellular and regenerative therapies, and the study of long-term health in recipients of organ transplants.
This new initiative will entail a number of construction projects at both NYPH/Columbia and CUMC. Renovation and expansion of existing inpatient and outpatient facilities will take place over a two-year period, starting later this year and extending to 2009. Work on the creation of a pediatric outpatient transplant center is slated to begin next winter. In 2009, the opening of a dedicated critical care unit specifically for transplant patients is planned.
—Marilyn Castaldi
