Episode Description
On this episode of Behind the Breakthrough, Dr. Mamatha Bhat shares how she and her team of UHN researchers are leveraging artificial intelligence to help predict complications resulting in long-term outcomes for liver transplant patients. This novel, world-first approach has the ability to determine the personalized predictors of outcome for each patient – for example, increased risk of cancer, heart disease, and cardiovascular events are examples of what compromise long-term survival following transplantation, especially after the one-year mark. This precision medicine approach can help identify which patients are at risk of which complications to help simulate diagnostic and therapeutic responses from a clinical practice perspective. Dr. Bhat speaks to the journey involved throughout the research process, as well as how she encourages future clinician-scientists to foster resiliency while engaging in their work as well as being opportunistic and creative.
About Dr. Mamatha Bhat
Dr. Mamatha Bhat is a Hepatologist and Clinician-Scientist at UHN's Ajmera Transplant Centre, and Associate Professor of Medicine at the University of Toronto. Dr. Bhat completed her medical school and residency training at McGill University. She then completed a Transplant Hepatology fellowship at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minnesota, followed by a Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) Fellowship for Health Professionals, through which she completed a PhD.
The goal of Dr. Bhat's research program is to improve long-term outcomes of liver transplantation through a precision medicine approach. Her program uses tools of Artificial Intelligence with bioinformatics to personalize the care of liver transplant recipients based on an improved biological understanding of the liver and disease after transplant. Her interdisciplinary program has been supported by the CIHR, Canadian Donation and Transplant Research Program (CDTRP), Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council (NSERC), Canadian Liver Foundation (CLF), among others. Dr. Bhat is Director of the Clinician-Scientist Training Program in the Dept of Medicine; Partnerships & Engagement Lead for the Temerty Centre for AI Research & Education in Medicine (T-CAIREM) at U of T; Chair of the International Liver Transplant Society Basic and Translational Science Research committee; on the Executive committee of the CDTRP, and an Associate Editor for the American Journal of Transplantation. Dr. Bhat has also been the recipient of recognitions such as the 2022 CIHR-INMD-CASL Early Career Researcher prize, CASL Research Excellence award and the 2021 American Society of Transplantation Basic Science Career Development Award. She has over 130 publications to her credit, including three senior-authored publications in Lancet Digital Health (Impact factor (IF) 36.4), along with additional senior-authored publications in Hepatology (IF 17), JAMA Surgery (IF 14), eClinical Medicine (IF 17), Journal of Hepatology (IF 30), Clinical Gastroenterology & Hepatology (IF 9), Nature Reviews Drug Discovery, Liver Transplantation and Transplantation.
Want to learn more about Dr. Bhat and her work?
Producer: Catherine Danko | Host: Christian Coté |
Sound Engineer: 217 Audio
