2017 National Donor Management Summit


Victor D. Bowers, MD, FACS
Associate Clinical Professor of Surgery, University of South Florida College of Medicine, FL

Victor D. Bowers, M.D., F.A.C.S., has been a member of Tampa General’s abdominal transplant programs since 1991. Dr. Bowers completed his residency in general surgery at the University of South Florida in 1984. He subsequently did transplant surgical fellowships at Cambridge University, with Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, England. He also completed an ASTS approved abdominal transplant fellowship at Ohio State University in Columbus, Ohio. Dr. Bowers has been certified by the American Board of Surgery since 1986. He currently holds an affiliate clinical teaching appointment with the USF Health Morsani College of Medicine as an associate professor of surgery, and has received Outstanding Educator Award several times over the past few years. He also is a member of FMQAI Medical Review Board for the End-Stage Renal Network 7, and serves as an associate medical director of LifeLink of Florida. He is an active member of the American Society of Transplant Surgeons, American Society of Transplantation, and Vascular Access Society of America. He is the executive director of abdominal transplantation at Tampa General Hospital. Over the years Dr. Bowers’ research interests have centered on the vascular effects of cyclosporine, immune modulation of vascularized tissue grafts, and he is currently the principal investigator of several ongoing drug trials with new immunosuppressive agents, and drugs which modulate ischemic reperfusion injury. In addition, he has a strong clinical interest in vascular access for hemodialysis patients and specializes in complex access issues. Dr. Bowers has been instrumental in a large portion of the 5,000 renal transplants which have been performed at Tampa General Hospital.

Dave DeStefano, MBA
Executive Director, LifePoint, Inc., SC

David DeStefano is the current CEO of LifePoint, Inc., in Charleston, SC, beginning this role in February 2017. LifePoint is the organ procurement organization serving South Carolina. Prior to this role, he served as the Executive Director of Translife in Orlando, Florida, from January 2015 – January 2017. Prior to his role at Translife, he served as the Director of Operations at Lifesharing in San Diego, CA, from August 2012 – January 2015. Other prior roles included serving as the Director of Recovery Services, a Clinical Recovery Coordinator and Manager of Recovery Services at Washington Regional Transplant Community. Dave holds a Master of Business Administration from The College of William & Mary, and is a nationally registered emergency medical technician- paramedic. He is a past and present member of various industry committees, including the UNOS Membership and Professional Standards Committee, UNOS Liver and Intestine Committee, UNOS Heart Lung Committee, UNOS Kidney Pancreas Outcome Improvement Committee, UNOS Disease Transmission Ad Hoc Committee, and the CMS Donor Management Task Force.

Alexandra Glazier, JD, MPH
President & CEO, New England Organ Donor Services – an affiliation of LifeChoice and New England Organ Bank, MA

Alexandra Glazier is President & CEO of New England Donor Services (NEDS), an affiliation between two Organ Procurement Organizations (OPOs); New England Organ Bank (NEOB) and LifeChoice. NEDS integrates clinical operations, staff and leadership of the two OPOs with the goals of increasing donation in the region and deriving financial efficiencies. NEDS serves 190 hospitals, 14 transplant centers and a population of 14 million people in six states. NEDS has 220 employees and a $68M annual operating budget. Prior to her current role, Alex was CEO of NEOB where she developed the vision for an affiliation with LifeChoice and negotiated the creation of NEDS. Other NEOB accomplishments under her leadership include coordination of over 1,000 organ transplants (42% increase over 2015), the first HIV+ organ donation for transplantation under the HOPE Act and the first GUVCA transplant in the U.S. NEOB was named Boston Globe Top Places to work in 2014, 2015 and 2016. Alex currently serves on the OPTN/UNOS Board of Directors and previously chaired the Ethics Committee. She held a 6yr appointment on the U.S. Secretary of HHS, Advisory Committee on Organ Transplantation (ACOT). She has worked to address regulatory barriers to conducting clinical trials in transplantation and has twice presented on this topic to the Institute of Medicine. Alex is Chair of the Legislative Committee for the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations (AOPO) and a consultant to Donate Life America including work on the recent Apple venture. Previously Alex was NEOB’s VP and General Counsel and practiced health law at the firm Ropes & Gray. Alex holds an undergraduate degree in bioethics from Brown University and a JD- MPH from Boston University where she has served as faculty.

Kiran Khush, MD, MAS
Associate Professor of Cardiovascular Medicine, Stanford University Medical Center, CA

Kiran Khush, MD is an Associate Professor in the Division of Cardiovascular Medicine at Stanford University, where she focuses on clinical and translational research in the field of heart transplantation. She has received research grant funding from the National Institutes of Health, the American Heart Association, and the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation. Dr. Khush’s research focuses on the evaluation and selection of donors for heart transplantation; the pathogenesis of post-transplant complications, including acute rejection and cardiac allograft vasculopathy; and non-invasive diagnosis of post-transplant complications. Dr. Khush is currently the Principal Investigator of the Donor Heart Study—a multi-center study involving 7 leading organ procurement organizations that aims to develop evidence-based guidelines for donor heart utilization.

Robert Kotloff, MD
Professor & Chairman, Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Cleveland Clinic, OH

Robert Kotloff, MD is a graduate of Brown University and Yale University School of Medicine. He completed residency training in Internal Medicine at Temple University Hospital, where he also served an additional year as chief resident. He then completed fellowship training in pulmonary and critical care medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. He subsequently joined the faculty at Penn, where he was a founding member and director of the Penn Lung Transplant Program. After 24 years on the Penn faculty, he left in 2014 to become Chairman of the Department of Pulmonary Medicine at the Cleveland Clinic. He has authored over 100 peer-reviewed articles, review articles, and book chapters, has edited five issues of Clinics in Chest Medicine, and is a co-editor of the recent 5th edition of Fishman’s Pulmonary Diseases and Disorders textbook. He directed the Pulmonary and Critical Care Fellowship Training Program at the University of Pennsylvania for 24 years. He served as Chair of the Pulmonary Disease Test Writing Committee of the American Board of Internal Medicine, Chair of the Transplant Network of the American College of Chest Physicians, and as President of the Association of Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Program Directors. He was an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine from 2010-14 and is currently a Section Editor for CHEST and an Associate Editor of the Annals of the American Thoracic Society. Dr. Kotloff was the 2011 recipient of the American College of Chest Physicians College Medalist Award recognizing meritorious service in furthering work in chest medicine. He was also the 2016 recipient of the American Thoracic Society Outstanding Educator Award which recognizes lifetime contributions in education and mentoring in the fields of pulmonary, critical care or sleep medicine.

Darren Malinoski, MD, FACS
Professor of Surgery, Oregon Health & Science University, Assistant Chief of Surgery – Research & Education, Section Chief, Surgical Critical Care, VA Portland Healthcare System, OR

Darren Malinoski, MD is an Assistant Chief of Surgery for Research and Education as well as the Chief of the Surgical Critical Care Section at the Portland VA Medical Center. He is also a Professor of Surgery in the Division of Trauma at Oregon Health & Science University in Portland, Oregon. A focal point for Dr. Malinoski’s research involves the incorporation of Donor Management Goals (DMGs) at the donor’s bedside. Dr. Malinoski is the physician leader of the UNOS DMG workgroup, which launched the nation’s first web-based Registry that contains donor management and recipient outcome data elements in a single location that is accessible for both performance improvement projects and research purposes. Dr. Malinoski served as the Co-PI of the multi-OPO Mild Hypothermia Randomized Controlled Trial, which utilized the DMG Web Portal as the foundation of its data and safety monitoring plan. The initial results of the study were published in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2015. Most recently, Dr. Malinoski received grant funding from the Laura and John Arnold Foundation to launch the Donor Management Research Initiative (DMRI) to facilitate the establishment of evidence-based standards of care for deceased organ donor management in order to increase the quality and quantity of transplantable organs. The DMRI will initially focus on National expansion of the DMG Registry as well as the conduct of a follow-up deceased organ donor interventional RCT comparing mild hypothermia to machine perfusion.

Thomas A. Nakagawa, MD, FAAP, FCCM
Professor (PAR) Anesthesiology & Critical Care, Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Chief, Division of Pediatric Critical Care Medicine, Director, Pediatric Intensive Care Unit, Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital, FL

Thomas A. Nakagawa, M.D., FAAP, FCCM, is a Professor of Anesthesia and Critical Care Medicine at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine where he also serves as Chief of Critical Care and Director of the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit at Johns Hopkins All Children’s Hospital in St. Petersburg, Florida. He also serves as the assistant medical director for Carolina Donor Services in Durham, North Carolina. Dr. Nakagawa serves on the Secretary of Health of Health and Human Services, Advisory Committee on Organ Transplantation (ACOT), is a member of the UNOS/OPTN Pediatric Transplant committee, and has been a consultant to the American Academy of Pediatrics for the revision of the pediatric organ donation and transplantation policy statement. His international work includes involvement with the expert panel for the Canadian Council for Donation and Transplantation, the Geneva Conference on Pediatric Donation, and the Canadian pediatric DCD initiative. Dr. Nakagawa is the lead author of the updated guidelines for the determination of brain death in infants and children from the Society of Critical Care Medicine (SCCM), American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), and the Child Neurology Society (CNS).

Michael J. Souter, MB, ChB, FRCA, FNCS
Chief of Anesthesiology, Harborview Medical Center, University of Washington, WA, Medical Director, LifeCenter Northwest

Michael Souter, MD is the current Medical Co-Director, Neurosurgical Critical Care, Harborview Medical Center in Seattle, Washington, an attending physician in Anesthesiology & Critical Care, Harborview Medical Center, Seattle, Washington as well as the Medical Advisor for the organ procurement organization, LifeCenter Northwest, in Bellevue, Washington. Dr. Souter also serves as a professor for the Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine and an adjunct professor in the Department of Neurosurgery at the University of Washington in Seattle. Dr. Souter currently serves on many national and local councils and committees, including the Examinations Committee, Diploma Board in Neurocritical Care, United Council for Neurologic Subspecialties; Neurocritical Care Subcommittee, Society of Neurosurgical Anesthesia and Critical Care; Medical Director’s Council, Association of Organ Procurement Organizations; Ethics Subcommittee, American Society of Anesthesiologists; Critical Care Medicine Subcommittee, American Society of Anesthesiologists; Ethics Committee - Brain Death Subcommittee, Neurocritical Care Society; Editor – Organ Donor Management Web Portal, Association of Organ Procurement Organizations, Medical Directors Council; Council on Accreditation of Educational Programs for the Emergency Medical Services Professions; The Organ Donation and Transplantation Alliance, Donor Management Leadership Council - Chair since 2017; and the Chair, Ethics Committee, Organ Donor Research Consortium. Dr. Souter has also authored numerous journal manuscripts, book chapters and other publications.

Harry E. Wilkins III, MD
Acute Care Surgeon, Quincy Medical Group, IL, Administrative Medical Director, Midwest Transplant Network

Harry E. Wilkins, III, MD, MHCM, FACS is an Acute Care Surgeon with Quincy Medical Group in Quincy, Illinois and serves as the Administrative Medical Director for Midwest Transplant Network. Dr. Wilkins is a founding member of the Midwest Transplant Network’s Critical Care Task Force (CCTF). Dr. Wilkins completed Medical School at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine in Chicago, Illinois through their 6 year Honor’s Program in Medical Education in 1986. Following a one-year internship in Internal Medicine at Maimonides Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, he returned to Chicago to complete a surgical residency at Columbus Hospital Programs before completing a Trauma and Surgical Critical Care Fellowship at the R Adams Cowley Shock Trauma Center in Baltimore, Maryland in 1993. He received a Master’s of Science in Health Care Management (MHCM) degree from the Harvard School of Public Health in 2009. Dr. Wilkins spent ten years in private practice as a trauma and critical care surgeon in Tyler, Texas and Overland Park, Kansas before relocating to Kansas City becoming the Medical Director for Trauma and Surgical Critical Care at Saint Luke’s Hospital in 2007. Dr. Wilkins is currently Board Certified in General Surgery and holds a certificate of added qualifications in Surgical Critical Care. He holds academic appointments at Assistant Clinical Professorship level at The University of Texas (Arlington and Tyler) and The University of Missouri at Kansas City.

Charley Wright, MD
Medical Director, LifeLink of Florida, FL

Charles E. Wright, M.D., is medical director of LifeLink of Florida in Tampa. He recently served on the membership and professional standards committee (MPSC) and its policy compliance subcommittee. Previously, he was a member of the MPSC performance analysis and improvement subcommittee. Dr. Wright is a member of the Organ Donation and Transplantation Alliance's Donor Management Leadership Council and co-chaired The Alliance's 2011 donor management summit. He has served as a medical advisor on the executive committee of the Association of Organ Procurement Organizations. He earned his medical degree from St. Louis University School of Medicine.