Our Team

Kidney Transplant Team

We believe the diverse strengths and abilities of our medical staff and our commitment to teamwork are instrumental to the effective treatment of patients with kidney and pancreas disease. Having spent their careers studying, treating and understanding the functioning of the kidney, as well as the network of subtle interactions between the kidney and the rest of the body, the physicians are able to precisely assess the evolving condition of the patient.

Highlighted below are key members of the team of transplant surgeons, transplant nephrologists and donor nephrologists who work closely on a daily basis to provide specialized care for patients at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) Transplant Surgery and Renal Medicine Clinics.

Stefan G. Tullius, MD, PhD, is Chief of the Division of Transplant Surgery and Associate Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. He is the Director of the Kidney/Pancreas Program and Principal Investigator of the Transplant Surgery Research Laboratory. Dr. Tullius is a trained abdominal transplant and general surgeon and specializes in adult kidney and pancreas transplantation. He also performs general abdominal, laparoscopic and endocrine surgery. Dr. Tullius has a strong interest in increasing the availability of donor organs and focuses his clinical and lab research on novel methods to improve organ quality and to individualize anti-rejection medication after transplantation.

Anil Chandraker, MD, is Assistant Director of the Transplant Research Center and also is Medical Director of the Kidney Transplant Program. He has broad research interest in transplantation, including basic, translational and clinical research. In the lab, his research interest focuses on dissecting out the role of T cell costimulatory pathways and the development of chronic rejection by using animal models of transplantation.

Sanjaya Kumar, MD, is Assistant Professor of Urological Surgery at Harvard Medical School and practices as a urologist and transplant surgeon for the Kidney/Pancreas Program. His surgical expertise is minimally invasive laparoscopic donor nephrectomy, and his clinical interests include renal tumors, benign enlargement of the prostate, and prostate and bladder cancer.

Sayeed Malek, MD, is Clinical Director of the Division of Transplant Surgery and Instructor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. His clinical specialties are kidney and pancreas transplantation, and his interests include laparoscopic donor nephrectomy, vascular access and clinical studies on ECD and DCD donors.

Edgar Louis Milford, MD, is a transplant nephrologist, immunogeneticist, and Director of the Transplant Fellowship Program. He also is Director of the Tissue Typing Laboratory and an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He has had a longstanding academic interest in the physiological, immunological, genetic and racial factors which are important in kidney and stem cell transplant outcomes. His research utilizes time-dependent multivariate analysis, often focused on a particular variable of interest, such as a genetic variant, but controlled for other factors that are confounding.

Nader Najafian, MD, is an assistant professor and associate physician. He has broad research interests in transplantation, including basic, translational and clinical research. In the lab, his research focuses on dissecting out the role of T cell costimulatory pathways to induce tolerance in experimental animal models and on developing biomarkers to monitor the immune status of transplant recipients.

Reza Abdi, MD, is a transplant nephrologist. The main theme of Dr. Abid’s research focuses on the role of ischemia reperfusion injuries in augmenting immunogenicity of allografts. He also has a research interest in the field of type 1 diabetes, examining the role of mesenchymal stem cells in down regulating autoimmunity.

Jamil Azzi, MD, is a transplant nephrologist and associate physician. The main focus of Dr. Azzi’s research is to establish novel therapeutic strategies in transplantation and in type 1 diabetes through nanotechnology. He is also studying the role of the different isoforms of the PI3K pathway in inducing tolerance.

Leonardo V. Riella, MD, PhD, is a transplant nephrologist and associate physician. Dr Riella takes care of patients with advanced kidney disease who are interested in transplantation, as well as patients who have already received a kidney transplant. He is an active researcher, with a particular focus on further understanding ways to selectively control the immune response to the transplanted organ while sparing the immune system's protection against infection and malignancy.

Julie Lin, MD, MPH, is a renal epidemiologist whose research focuses on prevention of chronic kidney disease and its associated complications. Current research interests include analyses of dietary factors and inflammatory biomarkers in progressive nephropathy in diabetic and non-diabetic kidney disease.  Another major area of investigation is associations of early kidney dysfunction with quality-of-life measures and their implications. How these factors affect the general population, as well as living kidney donors after nephrectomy, are of high interest to her research group. Cardiovascular disease risk in the setting of chronic kidney disease is another research interest. Ongoing work in the cohorts, such as the Nurses’ Health Study at Channing Laboratory, REGARDS and MESA, as well as in randomized trials such as TREAT and VITAL, provide rich sources for her scientific work.

Medical Specialists

Transplant Nephrology, Pharmacy and Physician Assistance

BWH medical specialists provide the expertise vital to making transplantation a success. After transplantation and throughout long-term follow-up care, the specialists closely monitor the patient's progress and help determine an individualized medication program. Our specialists will make careful assessments of the body's reaction to the transplant and adjust the anti-rejection medications that truly make the transplant viable.

Physician Assistants

Alison Kaprove

Kendall Schuyler

Nurse Coordinators and Social Worker

The specialized focus of our BWH surgical and medical staff is supplemented by the comprehensive expertise of our nurse coordinators and social worker, who provide around-the-clock support for the program.

From the initial screening process to in-hospital preparation and education, and throughout long-term follow-up care, our nurse coordinators and social worker provide treatment, information and, most importantly, close personal support. At any time, patients and their families can speak with someone who cares and someone who can immediately help, regardless of the issue or problem.

Our nurse coordinators and social worker believe that the deep personal bonds that develop between them and the patient are essential to their work and crucial to the overall success of the transplant program.

Nurse Coordinators (RN)

   
Kevin McComiskey       Michelle Scala

Social Workers
Barbara Levine, LICSW               Annette Pimenta, LICSW

Administrator             Julie Judge-Proulx