VCU news

By Leha Byrd

Virginia Commonwealth University Health is pleased to welcome Marlon F. Levy, M.D., as the new chair of the Division of Transplant Surgery and director of the VCU Hume-Lee Transplant Center.

Levy brings with him a wealth of knowledge and expertise. Before joining VCU Health, he served as the surgical director of transplantation for Baylor All Saints Medical Center for 13 years. At Baylor, he also served as medical director of the Islet Cell Transplant Program for Baylor Health Care System and medical director for the Southwestern Transplant Alliance in Dallas, one of the nation’s largest organ procurement organizations.

“It's a tremendous honor for me to join such a historic and prestigious transplant team. What an impressive legacy to build on. I very much look forward to diligently partnering with all stakeholders at VCU to broaden the program's reach, expand its clinical services and grow its research footprint,” said Levy, who began at VCU on Sept. 1.

It's a tremendous honor for me to join such a historic and prestigious transplant team. What an impressive legacy to build on. 

“We are pleased to have Dr. Marlon Levy joining us as the division chair of transplant surgery and director of the VCU Health Hume-Lee Transplant Center. He will be bringing expertise in cellular transplantation, specifically related to islet cell transplantation,” said Vigneshwar Kasirajan, M.D., chair of the Department of Surgery in the VCU School of Medicine. “He also brings strong leadership and technical skills from his role as surgical director of transplantation at the Baylor All Saints Medical Center. We are excited to have him lead the Hume-Lee Transplant Center into new areas of solid organ transplantation and maintain its stature as a leading transplant center.”

VCU Health’s Hume-Lee Transplant Center has a distinguished history of firsts, which includes performing Virginia’s first human kidney transplant and first liver transplant. The transplant center also opened one of the first tissue-typing labs in the world, and established Virginia’s first vascular access program. Its clinical liver cell transplant program has achieved national and international recognition.

Peggy Schaeffer is the nursing director and transplant administrator of the VCU Health Hume-Lee Transplant Center. Before this role, she was nurse manager of the Hume-Lee inpatient transplant unit, a one of a kind progressive care unit dedicated to kidney and liver transplant patients and donors.

The transplant center has a legacy of outstanding service and leadership, she said.

"The Hume-Lee program has a rich history of pioneering leadership in transplant, and with the appointment of Dr. Marlon Levy as the new chief and director, we are poised to be leaders for the future as well,” she said.

The center’s namesakes are David Hume, M.D., and Hyung Mo Lee, M.D. Hume, a pioneer in transplant surgery, performed Virginia’s first kidney transplant at the Medical College of Virginia, which later became VCU, in 1957. In 1973, following Hume's death, Lee became director of the Clinical Transplant Program, professor and head of the Division of Vascular and Transplant Surgery and director of the Clinical Transplant Fellowship Program at VCU.

“The care of our patients within a Magnet Nursing organization combined with Hume-Lee’s outstanding outcomes, now to be led by Dr. Levy, leads to a very exciting and promising future for transplant at VCU,” Schaeffer said.