They are challenged by uncovering new ways to treat their patients, as well as discovering better ways to manage the disease in the future. And the executive vice president is in a position to know. Maddrey, who is also the Arnold N. and Carol S. Ablon Professor in Biomedical Science, is an internationally recognized expert in liver medicine and was elected to fellowship in the Royal College of Physicians of London based on his reputation as a clinician, teacher and researcher. He is widely known for his research that resulted in the Maddrey Index, on which corticosteroid therapy for alcoholic hepatitis is based, as well as for his contributions to the use of interferon to treat chronic viral hepatitis, the understanding of the mechanisms of drug-induced liver injury and the treatment of primary biliary cirrhosis. That is in stark contrast to the present emphasis of many liver centers on transplantation.
Transplantation focuses on diseases that have gone beyond the stage of reversibility.
Reflecting on 40 years of liver medicine, Combes agrees that more effective and longer-lasting treatment and prevention is around the corner. We may find this through improved anti-viral agents. We may find it through the use of gene therapy.