CLINICAL RESEARCH TEAM
Lindsay Basto RN MSN
Manager
Clinical Research
Laurencia Perea RN BSN
Clinical Research Nurse
Lindsay has been leading clinical research related to islet transplantation since 2012. This year she was promoted to the position of the Clinical Research Manager to supervise the execution of research projects related to solid organ and islet transplantation in our Transplant Institute.
Laurencia is a graduate from the University of Oklahoma with experience in Phase I clinical trials. She has just joined the team as Clinical Research Nurse.
Piotr Jerzy Bachul MD
Research Fellow
Peter Borek MD
Research Fellow
Dr. Bachul accomplished his surgical training at Jagiellonian University in Krakow, Poland and initiated his research training in solid organ and islet transplantation at the University of Chicago in July 2017.
Peter has recently joined our team.
He lives in Chicago but graduated from the Medical University of Poznan, Poland.
Roi Atenby
Medical Student
Collaborator
Aaron Lucander
Student- Collaborator
Roi is from Tel Aviv University Israel, was accepted to a clinical surgical elective in the transplant service at UCM. After excelling in the clinical elective, he was enthusiastic in joining our research team as a project collaborator. His work focuses on the results of islet transplants in type 1 Diabetes Mellitus patients and the role of autoantibodies as possible future biomarkers.
Aaron recently graduated from Duke University and plans to attend medical school. His strong interests in clinical transplantation and autoimmunity motivated him to collaborate with our team.
CELL PROCESSING RESEARCH TEAM
Karolina Golab PhD
Lab Manager,
Pancreatic Islet and
T regulatory Cell
Project Manager
Ling-jia Wang MD PhD Technical Director,
BLA Senior Project Manager,
Islet Transplantation
CLINICAL TEAM
Martin is indispensable making sure that we can smoothly carry out all our experiments. He oversights supplies, equipment and logistics related to the experiments.
As a scientist, Karolina has been leading our T regulatory cell ex vivo expansion project bringing us closer to the first clinical application. As a manager, she organize and supervise daily activity of the lab.
Ling-jia has been devoted expert in the clinical islet isolation and now is focused on preparation of our application for a Biological License to FDA.
Martin Tibudan MS
Transplant Research
Specialist
Amanda Buerress
Transplant
Physician Assistant
Donna Komuda
Transplant
Nurse Practitioner
Amanda takes care of the patients, when they are admitted to the hospital for transplant procedures. She directly communicates with patients, providing them comfort, minimize stress and pain as well as makes sure all tests related to their care as well as study protocols are carried out properly.
Donna plays the same role as Amanda. She also comforts patients when in the hospital, ordering necessary medications and tests, arranging consultation alleviating pain and stress. She constantly coordinates patient care when in the hospital.
Christine Trotter
Transplant Nurse Practitioner
After 9 years of exemplary service to our patients, Christine decided to purse new exiting career opportunities.
Jesus Rodrigez III,
Organ Procurement Coordinator
Richard Cummings
Organ Procurement Coordinator
Jesse is working day and night-24/7, constantly reviewing potential donor charts looking for optimal organs for our patients. Along with his colleagues, they also coordinate transportation of the organs in the shortest possible time to our center, so they can be succesfully transplanted with the optimal outcome.
As other members of the Transplant Team, he plays a very important role in organ preparation and the outcome of the transplantation.
Rich is working day and night-24/7, constantly reviewing potential donor charts looking for optimal organs for our patients. Along with his colleagues, they coordinate transportation of the organs in the shortest possible time to our center, so they can be succesfully transplanted with the optimal outcome.
As other members of the Transplant Team, he plays a very important role in organ preparation and the outcome of the transplantation.
Lisa Potter Pharm D,
Pharmacist
Brenna Kane Pharm. D,
Pharmacist
Lisa is our pharmacy leader with great experience in clinical research involving testing new medication against placebo in the setting of randomized studies. She is critical in the preparation of the study medication, even if this means to come to the hospital in the middle of the night or weekend when transplants usually happen.
Brenna is our pharmacist who is deeply involved in the care of our kidney, pancreas and islet transplant patients. She makes sure they receive the right medications, with the right dose, at the right time. She warns us about drug interactions and side effects. Adjusting medications properly is critical for the well being of our patients chronically exposed to toxic anti-rejection medications.