$11 million grant from Sealy & Smith Foundation will fund the new program
GALVESTON, Texas - The University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston has established a comprehensive organ transplant center whose director plans to double the number of transplants currently done, broaden the type of organ transplants performed and increase the chances of Texans who are on waiting lists for a donor.
Dr. Luca Cicalese, who is director of the new Texas Transplant Center, said the center could greatly increase the chances of Texans who need a transplant, especially those in the Houston area, of getting an organ transplant.
Cicalese said that Galveston is in a different organ procurement area than Houston. "If a patient is in Houston and needs an organ transplant, he can be listed in Houston but can also come to Galveston and list also in Galveston."
UTMB, which recently restarted its lung transplant program, already performs heart, kidney and pancreas transplants. Cicalese, who performed the first intestinal transplant in New England in 2004, said the center would revitalize the liver transplant program and add islet cell and intestine transplant services sometime next year.
Cicalese said the transplant center at UTMB would be different in many ways because it will not only perform transplants but also provide medical care and services for people with organ failure or other diseases in advanced stages.
Dr. David L. Callender, president of UTMB, said Cicalese's vision for the center, which calls for 210 transplants by the year 2010, is "well thought-out and will benefit hundreds of Texans who might not otherwise receive the care they need."
"Dr. Cicalese's multi-disciplinary approach will mean that doctors from many different specialties will work together to provide our patients the best possible care, whether they eventually need an organ transplant or not," Callender said. "It's the people of Texas who will reap the benefits of his team."
Callender noted that UTMB doctors started performing kidney transplants more than 40 years ago and that the transplant center follows in that tradition and will provide leading-edge care for new generations of Texans.
The Sealy & Smith Foundation has given more than $11 million to UTMB to support a comprehensive transplant center.
Dr. Courtney M. Townsend Jr., chairman of the Department of Surgery, said that the "combination of the support from the Sealy & Smith Foundation and the outstanding qualifications of Dr. Cicalese will allow the university to enhance its regional and national reputation in transplantation and provide tertiary care services previously unavailable to our patients and referring physicians."
Cicalese said the center also would benefit from the work of medical researchers at UTMB.
"So, for anything that is discovered in the lab, we can actually be first in line to apply it to the patients," Cicalese said, citing the advanced research by UTMB scientists and doctors who investigate hepatitis C.
Cicalese, who came to UTMB from the University of Massachusetts Memorial Medical Center, said that he wants the center to "achieve excellence for all transplant services and the treatment of organ failure and to reach a level of excellence for clinical, teaching and research activities in Texas, nationally and internationally."
More information about Dr. Luca Cicalese
Dr. Luca Cicalese was born in Rome, Italy, and graduated from the University of Rome "La Sapienza" Facolta' di Medicine in Rome, in 1990. He completed his general surgery residency training from 1990 to 1995 at the University of Rome. Following his residency training, Cicalese completed a clinical fellowship in transplant surgery at the University of Pittsburgh, T.E. Starzl Transplantation Institute in Pittsburgh, Pa.
He has held faculty positions at the University of Rome, the University of Illinois at Chicago and most recently at the University of Massachusetts where he has served as associate professor of Surgery and Pediatrics and Section Chief for the Liver and Intestinal Transplant Programs
Cicalese was responsible for establishing the intestinal transplantation program at the University of Massachusetts. He and his team performed the first intestinal transplant in New England in May 2004. Cicalese joined the UTMB Department of Surgery faculty in August 2007.