Medical Expertise

Liver and Kidney Transplantation
Hepatobiliary Surgery
Liver and Biliary Resections
Advanced GI Oncology Surgery
Advanced Laparoscopic Solid Organ Surgery
General Surgery
Hepatocellular Carcinoma
Cholangiocarcinoma

Hospital Affiliation

University Hospital, Newark

INSURANCE PARTICIPATION

Insurance Participation: with Provider Number (where applicable)
The information below is subject to change and should not be relied upon until after it is verified with the insurance company. In addition, psychiatric providers should be contacted directly for information on their participation with managed care and insurance companies.

Aetna, Inc.

AmeriGroup

AmeriHealth of NJ

America's Choice Provider Network (ACPN)

Amerivantage Dual Coordination

Clover Health Plans

Devon Health Services/ULLICO

Horizon BCBS Managed Care

Horizon NJ Health

Horizon NJ Total Care(HNJH)

Horizon PPO Network

Medicaid

Medicare

MultiPlan

Prime Health Services, Inc.

Qual Care HMO

Qual Care PPO

Three Rivers Provider Network

UHC Comm/Oxford

United Healthcare Community Plan (formerly AmeriChoice of NJ, Inc.)

WellCare Health Plans

Overview

Keri E. Lunsford MD, PhD, FACS is an Assistant Professor of Surgery and a liver
transplant and hepatobiliary surgeon on faculty at Rutgers New Jersey Medical School
and a member of the Center for Immunity and Inflammation. Dr. Lunsford
received MD and PhD degrees from The Ohio State University as part of the Medical
Scientist Training Program, and she completed general surgery residency at Duke
University followed by fellowship in multi-organ abdominal transplantation
and hepatobiliary surgery at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She is
certified by both the American Board of Surgery and the American Society of Transplant
Surgeons. Prior to joining the faculty at Rutgers, she was on faculty at
Houston Methodist Hospital where she played a key role in the groundbreaking protocol
for liver transplant for intrahepatic cholaniocarcinoma. Her clinical interests include liver
transplant oncology, simultaneous liver kidney transplantation, and liver transplant futility.
She has an active translational transplant immunology research lab. Dr. Lunsford has
received funding from the Association of Women Surgeons, the NIH, the ASTS, and the
NJHF for her translational research in the mechanism and impact of pre-transplant
immune dysfunction in liver transplant recipient outcomes. She serves on several
national and international committees and is well-published in the field of transplant
surgery and transplant immunology.

Education

MD, 2007, The Ohio StateUniversity of Medicine
PHD, 2005, The Ohio State Univesity
BS, 1999, Miami University

Licensure & Certification

Medical Licensure
New Jersey

Certification
American Board of Surgery - Transplant Surgery (General Surgery Board)

Curriculum Vitae

View CV

Relevant Publications

Ayorinde, Tumininu, Guergana G. Panayotova, Anchal Sharma, Keri E. Lunsford. Clinical and biomarker assessment of frailty in liver transplantation. Current Opinion in Organ Transplantation. 2021 Aug 2. doi: 10.1097/MOT.0000000000000911. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 34343156. Douglas G. Farmer, Richard J. Knight, Gabriel M. Danovitch, H. Albin Gritsch, Xian C. Li, R. Mark Ghobrial, Ronald W. Busuttil, A. Osama Gaber. Delayed Implantation of Pumped Kidneys Decreases Renal Allograft Futility in Combined Liver- Kidney Transplantation. Transplantation. 2019. In press.

Rosenblatt, Russell, Hannah Lee, AnnMarie Liapakis, Keri E. Lunsford, Andrew Scott, Pratima Sharma, Julius Wilder. Equitable access to liver transplant: Bridging the gaps in the social determinants of health. Hepatology. 2021 Jun 1. doi: 10.1002/hep.31986. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 34060678.

Panayotova, Guergana, Jesus Rosado, Flavio Paterno, Dayanand Deo, George Dikdan, Matthew A. McCarty, Ben Arrington, Anthony Giudice, Prakash Rao, Adam Fano, Nehal Dhaduk, Keri E. Lunsford, Prakash Rao, James V. Guarrera. Novel Oxygenation Technique for Hypothermic Machine Perfusion of Liver Grafts: Validation in Porcine Donation after Cardiac Death (DCD) Liver Model. American Journal of Surgery. 2020 Nov;220(5):1270-1277. doi: 10.1016/j.amjsurg.2020.06.072. Epub 2020 Aug 8. PMID: 32892979.

35. Lunsford, Keri E., Vatche G. Agopian, Stephanie G. Yi, Duc T.M. Nguyen, Edward A. Graviss, Michael P. Harlander-Locke, Ashish Saharia, Fady M. Kaldas, Constance M. Mobley, Ali Zarripar, Mark Hobeika, Jeffery L. Veale, Hemangshu Podder, Douglas G. Farmer, Richard J. Knight, Gabriel M. Danovitch, H. Albin Gritsch, Xian C. Li, R. Mark Ghobrial, Ronald W. Busuttil, A. Osama Gaber. Delayed Implantation of Pumped Kidneys Decreases Renal Allograft Futility in Combined Liver-Kidney Transplantation. Transplantation. 2020 Aug;104(8):1591-1603. doi: 10.1097/TP.0000000000003040. PMID: 32732836.

Panayotova, Guergana G., James V. Guarrera, Keri E. Lunsford. Should We Re-evaluate Liver Transplantation as an Alternative to Resection for the Treatment of Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma? Liver Transplantation. 2020 Jun;26(6):748-750. doi: 10.1002/lt.25780. PMID: 32297472.

Victor, David W. III, Howard P. Monsour Jr., Maha Boktour, Keri E. Lunsford, Julius Balogh, Edward Graviss, Duc Nguyen, Robert Mcfadden, Mukul K. Divatia, Kirk Heyne, Victor Ankoma-Sey, Chukwuma Egwim, Joseph Galati, Andrea Duchini, Ashish Saharia, Constance M. Mobley, A. Osama Gaber, R. Mark Ghobrial. Outcomes of Liver transplantation for hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) beyond the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) criteria: A single center experience. Transplantation. 2020 Jan;104(1):113-121. doi: 10.1097/TP.0000000000002835.PMID: 31233480.

Korayem, Islam M., Vatche G. Agopian, Keri E. Lunsford, Hans A. Gritsch HA, Jeffrey L. Veale, Gerald S. Lipshutz, Hasan Yersiz, Coney L. Serrone, Fady M. Kaldas, Douglas G. Farmer, Suphamai Bunnapradist, Gabriel M. Danovitch, Ronald W. Busuttil, Ali Zarrinpar. Factors Predicting Kidney Delayed Graft Function Among Recipients of Simultaneous Liver-Kidney Transplantation: Single Center Experience. Clinical Transplantation. 2019 Jun;33(6):e13569. doi: 10.1111/ctr.13569. Epub 2019 May 7. PMID: 31006141; PMCID: PMC6653637.

Lunsford, Keri E, Milind Javle, Kirk Heyne, Rachna T. Shroff, Reham Adel-Wahab, Nakul Gupta, Constance Mobley, Ashish Saharia, David W. Victor, Duc T. Nguyen, Eward A. Graviss, Ahmed O. Kaseb, Thomas A. Aloia, Claudius Conrad, Howard Monsour, Jean- Nicolas Vauthey, A. Osama Gaber, R. Mark Ghobrial. Liver Transplantation for Locally Advanced Unresectable Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma Treated with Neoadjuvant Therapy: Preliminary Experience from the Methodist-MD Anderson Collaborative. Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology. 2018 May;3(5):337-348. doi: 10.1016/S2468- 1253(18)30045-1. Epub 2018 Mar 13. Erratum in: Lancet Gastroenterol Hepatol. 2018 Jun;3(6):e3. PMID: 29548617.

Lunsford, Keri E., Adam S. Bodzin, Daniela Markovic, Ali Zarrinpar, Fady M. Kaldas, Hans Albin Gritsch, Victor Xia, Douglas G. Farmer, Gabriel M. Danovitch, Jonathan R. Hiatt, Ronald W. Busuttil, Vatche G. Agopian. Avoiding futility in simultaneous liver-kidney transplantation: a single center analysis of 331 consecutive patients listed for dual organ transplant in the MELD era. Annals of Surgery. 2017 May; 265(5): 1016- 1024.

Lunsford, Keri E., Colin Court, Yong Seok Lee, David Lu, Bita Naini, Michael P. Harlander-Locke, Ronald W. Busuttil, Vatche G. Agopian. Comparative Analysis of Patients with Mixed Hepatocellular-Cholangiocarcinoma and Hepatocellular Carcinoma Undergoing Liver Transplantation: A Propensity Matched Cohort Analysis. Liver Transplantation. 2018 Oct;24(10):1384-1397. doi: 10.1002/lt.25058. PMID: 29573187.

Course List

MED9525K

Liver Disease & Transplant

Liver Transplant Research

Liver Transplant for Intrahepatic Cholangiocarcinoma

Experience last 35 years has generally excluded liver transplant as a treatment for
intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma; however, experience with hilar cholangiocarcinoma
has identified pretransplant radiation and chemotherapy strategies which improve
relapse-free and overall survival outcomes. Recently we reported that pre-transplant
chemotherapy combined with prolonged tumor stability of greater than six months can
also yield excellent overall and relapse-free outcomes for intrahepatic
cholangiocarcinoma (Lunsford, et al. Lancet Gastroenterology and Hepatology. 2018
May; 3(5): 337-348). These preliminary outcomes have prompted a current multi-center
investigation into the potential to expand current liver transplant efforts for the treatment
of intrahepatic cholangiocarcinoma, a disease in which few other alternatives offer the
possibility of a cure.

Liver Transplant Immunologic Frailty

Due to organ shortage, livers are transplanted in order of recipient medical urgency;
however, ethical principles dictate avoidance of futile transplantation. Due to imbalance
in supply and demand for organs, illness severity (categorized by MELD score) has
drastically increased. MELD does not correlate well with risk of death post-transplant;
thus, better metrics to evaluate risk of mortality are necessary. The most common cause
of death early after liver transplant relates to consequences of an immune system which
is frail or dysfunctional prior to transplant. In pre-transplant cirrhotics, immune
frailty may relate to metabolic deficiencies or T cell exhaustion and may affect liver
transplant outcomes.

Our laboratory currently evaluates the pre-transplant state of immunologic frailty which
potentially results from cirrhosis-related alterations in recipient metabolism, including T
cell metabolic dysfunction, T cell exhaustion, and alterations to the innate and adaptive
immune activation, proliferation, and function. We have developed a pre-transplant set of
biomarkers which can stratify patients at risk for adverse outcomes such as infection,
malignancy, and death following liver transplantation, and we aim to develop therapies to
prevent such consequences long-term.