Montefiore Health System has a new collaborative program with its partner St. John’s Riverside Hospital to offer patients suffering from kidney, pancreas or liver disease an opportunity to be evaluated for transplantation at St. John’s Riverside Hospital by specialists from Montefiore Einstein Center for Transplantation. The collaboration is designed to increase continuity of care for patients and their families with their local healthcare providers and transplant experts in an easy, accessible manner.

“Earlier evaluation of patients suffering from kidney, pancreases and liver disease can help identify potential barriers to being placed on transplant lists and determine if alternative medical or surgical therapies would be most appropriate,” said Milan Kinkhabwala, M.D., chief of the Division of Transplantation and director of abdominal transplantation at the Montefiore Einstein Center for Transplantation, and professor of surgery at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. “We encourage transplant candidates to take advantage of these consultations as they can help ensure comprehensive care is initiated in a timely fashion. It will also allow us to identify how to best keep patients as healthy as possible and improve their quality of life while they await a transplant.”

Montefiore Einstein Center for Transplantation reports that Montefiore adult patient survival rates consistently rank higher than the national average, with a 95.09 percent liver transplant one-year survival rate vs. a 90.89 percent national liver transplant one-year survival rate, according to the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services.

“St. John’s Riverside Hospital is excited to partner with Montefiore in this collaborative transplant program,” said Paul P Antonecchia, M.D., chief medical officer, St. John’s Riverside Hospital. “As we seek to provide expanded healthcare services to our community, this type of collaboration will positively impact the level of care that we can provide closer to our patients’ homes.”

For information about scheduling appointments please call 1-888-RX-LIVER (1-888-795-4837) or 1-877-CURE-KDNY (1-877-287-3536) or email: transplant@montefiore.org