The donation and transplant community has been improving equity in access to transplant, but there is more work to be done. Jesse Schold, Ph.D., will speak at the 2023 Transplant Management Forum about system-level disparities in organ transplantation and how the community can mitigate them.
Tell us about your background.
I recently joined the University of Colorado after being at Cleveland Clinic for 13 years. The primary focus of my work has been on transplantation and organ disease, with a specific interest in quality metrics, healthcare policy and disparity in access to care.
When I was getting my Ph.D., I worked as a Master’s level biostatistician. At the time I was naïve to the field of transplantation; but as I have been immersed in the clinical application, I’ve found that transplant is a rich context for epidemiology and health services research. There are so many important questions and a great deal of access to data. It’s a fast-moving field, so you can quickly see changes emerge as a result of research and policy changes.
I’ve always had an interest in health equity and disparity. Unfortunately the field of transplantation has always seen stark inequity, but there are a lot of opportunities to attenuate those inequities. There are different analytic approaches and policy interventions that can be used to stem those disparities.
What will you be presenting about at TMF?
The topic of inequity is timely and one that we really need to consider broadly in the community. Transplantation is a critical intervention for patients, irrespective of whether they are on the waiting list or not.
We will discuss ways we can be thoughtful about addressing the needs of this broader population and how policy can be responsive in not just improving outcomes for transplanted patients, but also this broader number who are never listed for transplant. We’ll also talk about how we can utilize resources more efficiently or leverage our resources to treat more patients and increase the number of donor organs.
What are you hoping TMF attendees will learn if they attend your session?
I’m interested in hearing how representatives from different transplant programs see these policy changes and their ideas for innovations. While there will always be competition, we don’t want that to be detrimental to our patients; we can work collectively and synergistically. I want to challenge the audience to continue this conversation beyond TMF and be collaborative in these efforts.
Learn more at 2023 Transplant Management Forum in Denver, Colorado. Registration is now open.
Thank you to our TMF sponsors
This session is generously supported by Takeda Pharmaceuticals.
