A young woman who underwent a high-stakes liver transplant at The Mount Sinai Hospital in May is now safely back home thanks to an extraordinary collaboration between Stephan Mayer, MD, Director of the Institute for Critical Care Medicine, and Sander Florman, MD, Charles Miller, MD, Professor of Surgery and Director of the Recanati/Miller Transplantation Institute, and their teams.
As a college sophomore, Joanna Adler was unexpectedly diagnosed with a rare illness called Wilson’s disease, and underwent an urgent liver transplant at The Mount Sinai Hospital. Today, 16 years later, Ms. Adler remains close to her physician, Leona Kim-Schluger, MD, the Sidney J. Zweig Professor of Medicine at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Associate Director of the Recanati/Miller Transplantation Institute. Ms. Adler is also a strong supporter of Mount Sinai, which she credits for saving her life.
It was the longest drive of Kelly Smith’s life: four hours in an ambulance from Syracuse, N.Y., to The Mount Sinai Hospital beside her 9-day-old daughter, Matilda, who was critically ill. Seemingly healthy on the day she was born in early September, Matilda had become lethargic and sick after nursing only a few days later. Tests in Syracuse revealed acute neonatal liver failure—a rare, life-threatening condition. Matilda’s best hope was a liver transplant.