Robert Montgomery, MD, director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, became a patient of the program he leads in September 2018. He required a heart transplant because of a genetic form of heart disease, familial cardiomyopathy, and accepted a heart from a donor with hepatitis C.

Dr. Montgomery, also a professor in the Department of Surgery, returned to the operating room (OR) on January 31 to perform his first kidney transplant as the lead surgeon since his transplant. His patient was also a heart transplant recipient who now needed a kidney transplant due to the effects of his immunosuppressant drug regimen.

Dr. Montgomery faced new challenges before returning to the OR, including starting a new drug regimen without the side effect that kept him from surgery, tremors. “The operating room is the place where I feel the most at home,” says Dr. Montgomery. “I fought really hard to become a surgeon and stay in the game, and it was really important that I overcome this.”

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