Fundamentals of Liver Disease - Cirrhosis 2.0

Patrick S. Kamath MBBS, MD, DM is Professor of Medicine and Consultant in Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine and Science, Rochester, Minnesota. He graduated in 1976 from St John’s Medical College in Bangalore and subsequently, underwent postgraduate training at the Postgraduate Institute of Medical Education & Research (PGIMER) in Chandigarh, the premier medical post-graduate training Institute in India. He received the Jane and Camillo Patrao Prize in Medicine at St John’s Medical College, and the Kataria Gold Medal (an award for the most outstanding postgraduate student) at the PGIMER.  He completed both his MD in Medicine (1980) and is DM in Gastroenterology (1982) at the PGIMER.  On his return to Bangalore in January 1983 he joined St John’s Medical College, Bangalore University and quickly rose to the position of Associate Professor and then Professor and Chief at the Department of Gastroenterology. At a national and international level, Patrick S. Kamath has been honored with the Distinguished Educator Award of the American Gastroenterology Association in 2015 and the Distinguished Educator/Mentor award of the American Association for the Study of liver Diseases in 2018. He delivered the Eugene Schiff oration at the AASLD annual meeting in 2017. 

Professor Kamath’s academic research has appeared in top-ranking journals including the New England Journal of Medicine, Nature Genetics, the Lancet, British Medical Journal, Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and the Journal of Hepatology.  He has served as Associate Editor at different times for the foremost journals in the field: Hepatology, Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology, and Journal of Hepatology. With more than 500 papers to his name, he has published widely in various fields, but particularly in the study of clinical outcomes related to cirrhosis and portal hypertension, vascular diseases of the liver, and polycystic liver disease.  He has written over 100 chapters in standard texts.  However, he is mostly known for his work in the development of the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) score.  

Guadalupe Garcia-Tsao, MD, FAASLD is Professor of Medicine, Chief of Digestive Diseases and Program Director of the Hepatitis C Resource Center at Veteran’s Administration-Connecticut Healthcare System, as well as Director of Clinical and Translational Core at Yale Liver Center. She is a past president of AASLD. She received her M.D. and training at Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Mexico. Her primary research focus is on clinical research which focuses on cirrhosis and its complications, and she also is involved in the study of bacterial infections in cirrhosis, a complication that is often overlooked.

Juan G. Abraldes, MD is a Transplant Hepatologist, Professor and Director of the Liver Unit at the University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada. He gained his MD in 1995 from the University of Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and got his Board Certificate in Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the Liver Unit, Hospital Clinic, University of Barcelona (2000). He did a postdoctoral training at Yale University (2003–2004).

He has published over 200 manuscripts on the pathophysiology, diagnosis and management of end-stage liver disease. He has co-authored the international Baveno guidelines for the management of portal hypertension in 2005, 2010 and 2015. He is the co-author of the American Association for the Liver Clinical Guidance for the management of varices and variceal bleeding in cirrhosis. He was the chair of the AASLD Portal Hypertension Special Interest Group from 2017-2018.

Florence Wong, MD is a full professor at the University of Toronto and staff Hepatologist at the Toronto General Hospital, Ontario, Canada. She received her medical degree from the University of Melbourne, Australia and completed her postgraduate training in Australia and in Toronto, Canada. Apart from caring for a large population of patients with advanced liver cirrhosis, Dr. Wong has been active in research in the pathogenesis of portal hypertension, ascites formation, liver-kidney interaction, including the development of hepatorenal syndrome, and renal failure in cirrhosis for the past 28 years. She has received research funding from various funding agencies including the Canadian Institutes of Health Research, Canadian Liver Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.

She has been the Secretary of the International Ascites Club, organizing two international meetings on the complications of ascites, she also held the position as the Chair of the Education Committee of the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver. Recently, she served as the Chair of the "Acute-on-Chronic Liver Failure Special Interest Group" of the American Association for the Study of the Liver, and organizer of the Single Topic Symposium of Acute-on-Chronic Liver Failure. Currently, she is the Deputy Editor of Liver Transplantation. She is also the recipient of the Gold Medal from the Canadian Liver Foundation and the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver for her contribution to academia in Hepatology.

She has published widely on the topics related to ascites, and renal dysfunction in cirrhosis. She has more than 200 peer-reviewed publications as well as contributing regular reviews, book chapters and editorials on similar topics. She is currently on the writing committee to write the guidelines for the management of refractory ascites for the American Association for the Study of the Liver. Most recently, she has been responsible for putting together a landmark international document defining renal failure in cirrhosis.

Raimund Pichler, MD is an Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Washington in Seattle, WA. Dr. Pichler is a board-certified Nephrologist and director of the Kidney-Liver program at the University of Washington. His clinical focus is to improve patient care of patients with renal issues associated with liver disease or liver transplantation. 

Dr. Pichler has been a Co-Investigator in several hepatology related trials and has been teaching and mentoring Medical Students, Residents and Fellows at the University of Washington for almost two decades. Dr. Pichler has been on the editorial board of several Nephrology journals and has lectured both nationally and internationally.  

Jasmohan S. Bajaj, MBBS, MD, MS, FACG, AGAF, FRCP, FAASLD is Professor of Medicine, Division of Gastroenterology, Hepatology, and Nutrition at Virginia Commonwealth University and Richmond, VA Medical Center in Richmond, VA. He is a Fellow of the American College of Gastroenterology, American Gastroenterological Association, American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal College of Physicians in London and to the American Society for Clinical Investigation. Dr. Bajaj earned his MBBS from Delhi University at Maulana Azad Medical College. He completed an internship in internal medicine at Delhi University at Maulana Azad Medical College and internal medicine residency at the State University of New York Health Science Center in Brooklyn. He furthered his medical training with a fellowship in gastroenterology and hepatology at the Medical College of Wisconsin Affiliated Hospitals, then went on to earn an MS in epidemiology at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee.

Active in research, Dr. Bajaj has served as a principal investigator or co-investigator for numerous clinical trials in areas such as hepatic encephalopathy, chronic liver disease and microbiome. Dr. Bajaj’s research has been funded through the NIH, US Veterans Affairs, AHRQ, and American College of Gastroenterology. His work has been published in Nature, New England Journal of Medicine, Gastroenterology, Journal of Hepatology, Hepatology, The American Journal of Gastroenterology, and Liver Transplantation, among others. Dr Bajaj is the upcoming Co-Editor in Chief for the American Journal of Gastroenterology and is currently an associate Editor for the Red Journal and Gut Microbes. He is on the editorial board for Journal of Hepatology, Hepatology, and Liver Transplantation. He was a member of the AASLD/EASL Hepatic Encephalopathy Guidelines Writing Committee, is the Chairperson of the Acute-on-Chronic Liver Failure ACG Clinical Guidelines and a member of the AASLD ICU and ACLF Guidance committee. He is also a member of the AASLD Clinical Research Committee. Dr Bajaj is the Chairperson for the North American Consortium for Study of End-Stage Liver Disease and was the immediate Past President of the International Society for Hepatic Encephalopathy and Nitrogen Metabolism.

Puneeta Tandon, MD, FRCPC is an associate professor of medicine, co-director of the Cirrhosis Care Clinic and transplant hepatologist at the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada. She completed her internal medicine, hepatology and clinical epidemiology training at the University of Alberta with additional training at Yale University and the Hospital Clinic in Barcelona.

Dr. Tandon’s clinical practice and research are focused on cirrhosis with research interests including cirrhosis related complications, malnutrition, frailty, exercise therapy, palliative care and integrative health approaches such as meditation and behavior change techniques. It is her career goal to provide wholistic, interdisciplinary, patient-centered care through evidence, education, empowerment, engagement and teamwork.

Michael B. Fallon, MD, FAASLD is Professor and Chair of the Department of Medicine at the University of Arizona College of Medicine – Phoenix (UACOMP). A national expert in transplant hepatology and pulmonary complications of cirrhosis, he is actively involved in translational and multicenter clinical studies of hepatopulmonary syndrome and portopulmonary hypertension. He has over 140 publications with 30 years of academic medicine experience including extensive patient care, education, leadership and clinical investigation in internal medicine. In his role as Chair of the Department of Medicine, Dr. Fallon provides executive leadership to many of the multidisciplinary programs at Banner – University Medical Center Phoenix, ten UACOMP divisions, and more than 160 residents and fellows.

Dr. Fallon has received numerous awards recognizing his accomplishments in academic medicine including teaching, research and innovation.  Additionally, he has held numerous leadership positions in professional organizations including multiple committees of the American Association for the Study of Liver Disease, member of the American Board of Internal Medicine Transplant Hepatology Test Committee for 9 years and is a past senior associate editor of Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology.  He also serves as the lead author for the Diseases of the Liver and Biliary System Chapters for Cecil Essentials of Medicine for the past 15 years.

Paul Martin MD, FAASLD is Professor of Medicine and Chief of the Divisions of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at the University of Miami, USA. He is a native of Dublin, Ireland, where he graduated from medical school at University College, Dublin. He specialized in internal medicine and gastroenterology, training initially in Dublin and subsequently in Canada. He trained in hepatology as a Medical Staff Fellow in the Liver Unit, NIH, Maryland, USA. He is Editor-in Chief of Liver Transplantation and Editor of Handbook of Liver Disease. He was previously a Councilor for AST of the American Society of Transplant. He has had a long standing interest in viral hepatitis and organ transplant.