Newswise — Internationally renowned surgeon Robert A. Montgomery, MD, DPhil, FACS, whose groundbreaking work in kidney transplantation includes laparoscopic innovations and the “domino” chain of transplants, will join the faculty of NYU Langone Medical Center as director of its newly created Transplant Institute, effective March 1, 2016.
Most recently, Dr. Montgomery served as chief of the Division of Transplantation at The Johns Hopkins Hospital, where he was a professor of surgery and director of the Comprehensive Transplant Center and the Incompatible Kidney Transplant Program. While at Hopkins, he was part of the team that developed laparoscopic procurement of a live kidney donation through small incisions in the abdomen. This approach is now a standard practice for kidney donation worldwide.
His team also accomplished many other “firsts,” including multi-way donor exchanges, or “domino” exchanges. These occur when a living kidney donor, who is not compatible with a particular recipient—such as a family member or friend—instead donates a kidney to another recipient and that recipient’s original donor exchanges kidneys with another patient, thereby enabling two recipients to receive healthy kidneys, where no transplants were possible before. In 2010, Dr. Montgomery led a 10-way open chain of donors, thus placing him in the Guinness Book of World Records for the most kidney transplants performed in one day.
“Dr. Montgomery’s record of innovation and excellence in the field of transplant surgery is exceptional,” says Robert I. Grossman, MD, the Saul J. Farber Dean and CEO of NYU Langone Medical Center. “We are delighted he is joining us to develop and oversee the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, affirming our commitment to world-class patient care and clinical research in our transplant services.”
Dr. Montgomery’s arrival signals yet another major step forward at NYU Langone to advance its position in the field of transplantation. In August 2015, a team of over 100 physicians and other healthcare professionals, under the auspices of its Hansjörg Wyss Department of Plastic Surgery, successfully completed what is widely considered the most extensive face transplant to date. In addition, the NYU Langone Division of Transplant Surgery was one of the first in the country to implement a living-donor liver transplant program. With the new NYU Langone Transplant Institute, under which all transplant services now fall, our multidisciplinary team will continue to provide outstanding patient care, advance its recognized excellence in donor safety, and expand to offer additional comprehensive transplant services. A prolific researcher and educator, Dr. Montgomery has authored or co-authored more than 220 peer-reviewed publications and given nearly 200 invited lectures. In addition to his many academic honors and distinctions, including a Fulbright Scholarship and a Thomas J. Watson Fellowship, his contributions to the field of transplantation were recognized by the National Kidney Foundation of Maryland with the Champion of Hope Award in 2007. In 2013, the National Kidney Registry honored him with the Terasaki Medical Innovation Award.
After graduating magna cum laude with a Bachelor of Science in Biology from St. Lawrence University, Dr. Montgomery graduated with honors from the University of Rochester School of Medicine, and received his doctor of philosophy from Balliol College at the University of Oxford, England in molecular immunology. He completed his general surgical training, postdoctoral fellowship in human molecular genetics, and transplantation surgery fellowship at The Johns Hopkins Hospital.
“I am delighted to join the faculty of NYU Langone Medical Center,” Dr. Montgomery says. “This institution has been at the forefront of many innovations in transplantation, most notably its work in liver and facial transplantation. With the escalation of illnesses like diabetes, and with NYU Langone expanding its services into many more communities, there is greater demand for us to broaden our scope of services, strengthen key services like kidney transplantation, and develop and implement new innovations and surgical approaches to help our vastly growing and diverse patient population.”
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