Dr. Robert S. Brown, Jr.

Weill Cornell Medicine has received a $2 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to participate in a multicenter clinical initiative focused on understanding and treating cirrhosis, scarring of the liver that leads to the organ’s failure and increases the risk of liver cancer.

Dr. Robert S. Brown, an outstanding physician-scientist who combines clinical care with research focused on improving outcomes for patients with liver diseases, has been named chief of the Division of Gastroenterology and Hepatology at Weill Cornell Medicine and NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center, effective Aug. 1.

Black patients who have chronic liver failure, also known as end stage liver disease (ESLD), are less likely to be placed on a waiting list for a life-saving liver transplant than other racial and ethnic groups, according to a study of national databases by investigators at Weill Cornell Medicine, NewYork-Presbyterian and Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons.