2 Surgeons At Newark Hospital Are Saving Lives With Transplants

NEWARK, NJ — Only 12 percent of transplant surgeons nationwide are women. But according to Keri Lunsford, she’s proud to be among them – and she looks forward to seeing that number rise in the future.

Lunsford and her peer, Grace Lee-Riddle, who are part of the liver transplant center team at University Hospital in Newark, were recently honored during the second annual “Toast to Our Heroes” benefit fundraiser, which marked National Doctor’s Day.

According to the University Hospital Foundation, the pair of surgeons are helping the department build a name for itself:

“While female recipients and female surgeons are underrepresented in liver transplant surgery, Drs. Lunsford and Riddle are among the growing number of women performing life-saving transplants. University Hospital launched the very first Liver Transplant Center in New Jersey in 1989. Since then, the team has performed more than 1,600 liver and 50 kidney transplants. University Hospital’s transplant survival rates are ranked amongst the top in the United States, according to the Scientific Registry of Transplant Recipients. In the past decade, the Liver Transplant Program has treated more Charity Care patients than any other program in the United States. On the cutting edge of technology, the program’s development and use of liver preservation technology has allowed transplantation of people who would not have had access to transplants previously.”

Lunsford said the Toast to Our Heroes’ honor is of importance to her because it highlights the profound impact of the hospital’s diverse team, including women.

Lee-Riddle said the transplant team is “supportive, collaborative and works hard,” an assessment that Lunsford agreed with.

“As a surgeon-scientist, I appreciate both the academic and clinical goals of this institution,” Lunsford said. “Their focus on diversity and inclusion both within the faculty and the community that we serve have made me feel supported in achieving my goal.”

The University Hospital Foundation provided the following background about each surgeon:

• Keri E. Lunsford, MD, PhD, FACS is an Assistant Professor of Surgery and a liver transplant and hepatobiliary surgeon on faculty at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School and a member of the Center for Immunity and Inflammation. Prior to joining the faculty at Rutgers, she was on faculty at Houston Methodist Hospital where she played a key role in the groundbreaking protocol for liver transplant for intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, and she is internationally recognized as an expert in this field.
• Grace S. Lee-Riddle, MD, MSME is an Assistant Professor in the Division of Transplantation and Hepatobiliary Surgery at Rutgers, New Jersey Medical School. She graduated from the University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine. She completed her residency in general surgery at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania where she also completed a Fellowship in Advanced Biomedical Ethics and obtained a Master of Science in Medical Ethics at the University of Pennsylvania. She subsequently completed her fellowship in Multi-Organ Transplantation and Hepatobiliary Surgery at New York-Presbyterian Hospital Columbia University and Weill Cornell Medical Centers.

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