Our LHI Team | Board of Directors
Cofounder and Chair of LHI. Thelma has been in the liver health education arena for over five decades following the loss of her infant son Dean to biliary atresia. She formerly ran the American Liver Foundation and Hepatitis Foundation International for a combined 30 years.
Thelma King Thiel, RN, BA
Treasurer, Secretary, and Cofounder of the Liver Health Initiative, Malki has a background in advocating for primary prevention and health education/literacy. Her other interests include addressing the increasingly relevant social determinants of health through policy and programmatic avenues.
Malki De Silva, MPH
Board Member, Dr. David Pound is the President of the Indianapolis Gastroenterology Research Foundation. He has participated in numerous clinical research studies and has contributed to many medical publications. He was honored as an inaugural Fellow of the
American Association for the Study of Liver Disease (AASLD) in 2014.
David Pound, MD
Thelma King Thiel, RN
Malki De Silva, MPH
Arun Sanyal, MD
David Pound, MD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, specialist in Gastroenterology and Transplant Hepatology.
Stuart C. Gordon, MD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, Pediatric Gastroenterologist.
Kathleen Schwarz, MD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, awarded the 2020 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for the discovery of Hepatitis C virus, Canada Excellence Research Chair in Virology, Li Ka Shing Professor of Virology.
Michael Houghton, PhD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative.
Guanghao Tao
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, Chairman of the National Coalition on Health Care, Principal and Founder of Lewin and Associates LLC.
Jack Lewin, MD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, Partner at DLA Piper.
Donna Thiel, JD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, Professor of Preventive Medicine at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
William Schaffner, MD
Board Member of the Liver Health Initiative, Founding Director of Li Ka Shing Institute of Virology.
D. Lorne Tyrrell, MD, PhD
Stuart C. Gordon, MD
Jack Lewin, MD
Michael Houghton, PhD
William Schaffner, MD
David Pound, MD
Kathleen Schwarz, MD
Guangho Tao
Donna Thiel, JD
D. Lorne Tyrrell, MD, PhD
Advocates for Prevention
Our Advisory Board, comprised of talented and open-minded leaders, is committed to helping us address the stigma surrounding liver-related diseases while also promoting primary prevention and liver health education.
President of the Hepatitis B Foundation and Baruch S. Blumberg Institute; Professor and Chair, Department of Translational Research, Adjunct Professor, University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and Drexel University College of Medicine. Dr. Block is also a Fellow of the US National Academy of Inventors.
Timothy M. Block, PhD
Assistant Vice Dean and Program Leader, Integrated Health Disparities, University of Illinois Extension, College of Agriculture, Consumer and Environmental Sciences and Administrative Director of University of North Chicago Abriendo Caminos Program.
Margarita Teran, MD, PhD
President of the World Hepatitis Alliance, Medical Director of the Center for Asian Health at Saint Barnabas Medical Center and Medical Director of the Chinese Medical Program of Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center.
Zobair M. Younossi, MD, MPH
MPH Adjunct Professor of Law at the Georgetown University Law Center and the Associate Director of the Infectious Diseases Initiative at the O’Neill Institute, overseeing the Hepatitis Policy Project. Sonia focuses on national hepatitis C (HCV) law and policy issues. She is also a part of the O’Neill Institute’s Addiction and Public Policy Initiative.
Sonia Canzater, JD, MPH
Chief Medical Officer at Glympse Bio, member of the Board of Directors of Arbutus Biopharma Corp, former Vice President of Medical Affairs, Gilead and former Medical Director of Liver Transplantation at Cedar-Sinai Medical Center.
Tram Tran, MD, PhD
Medical Director of the Asia Pacific Health Foundation and of the Hepatitis B Foundation. Adjunct Professor of Medicine at University of Nevada Schools of Medicine in Las Vegas and Reno. Adjunct Professor Pharmacy at Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences at UCSD. Clinical Prof. of Med. at Loma Linda Univ and Staff Physician at their Transplant Clinic in Las Vegas.
Robert G. Gish, MD
Professor Emeritus of Internal Medicine at The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas and has excelled in a myriad of roles with prominent universities such as Thomas Jefferson University, and Johns Hopkins University serving as a professor as well as Assistant Dean of Post-Doctoral programs and faculty development.
Willis Maddrey, MD
Former Deputy Surgeon General and Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health, HHS and current Senior Vice President, Chief Strategy Officer, Senior Vice President, Chief Strategy Officer at University of North Texas Health Science Center.
Sylvia Trent-Adams, RN, PhD
Interim chairman and Professor of Medicine, Physiology and Molecular Pathology – Division of Gastroenterology at Virginia Commonwealth University Medical Center and chairman of the NIH NASH Clinical Research Network, the Liver Forum for NASH and Fibrosis and leader of the Stravitz-Sanyal Institute for Liver Disease and Metabolic Health at VCU.
Arun Sanyal, MD
President of the World Hepatitis Alliance, Medical Director of the Center for Asian Health at Saint Barnabas Medical Center and Medical Director of the Chinese Medical Program of Cooperman Barnabas Medical Center.