Professor Adetola Kassim
Dr. Kassim has treated patient care as a profession and a humanitarian and global health mission. His proficiency and leadership in hematopoietic stem cell transplantation (HSCT) have advanced the field in using a non-myeloablative conditioning regimen; HSCT is a curative modality in managing various benign and other hematologic disorders. He is exploring using a non-myeloablative haploidentical Bone Marrow Transplant (haploBMT) as a curative modality for patients with severe SCD. To address the challenge in adults with SCD and increase engraftment rates while maintaining a low mortality, he established a multi-center collaborative group in 2013. We have successfully shown improved outcomes, increased donor options, and extended this novel curative therapy to more eligible patients with SCD in the South-East United States. The promising results from this pilot phase II trial have resulted in a National NHLBI BMT-Clinical Trial Network-supported protocol in 2017 on haploidentical BMT in SCD. I am also a co-investigator of 2-NINDS-funded clinical trials (SPIN and SPRING) on stroke prevention in sub-Saharan African children with sickle cell anemia. SPIN is the first NIH-sponsored clinical trial on SCD in Africa, where the disease is most prevalent. Through these trials, we have successfully built the infrastructure and capacity of the research team in Kano, in Northern Nigeria.
He frequently travels to West Africa (Ghana and Nigeria) to advance the care of children and adults with SCD in low-resource settings. One of those efforts resulted in reducing the maternal mortality among women with SCD >80% at Korle-Bu Teaching Hospital in Accra, Ghana, using a multidisciplinary approach (Am J Hematol. 2019 Feb;94(2):223-230). He is also a member of the American Society of Hematology Committee on Promoting Diversity – A committee responsible for research scholarship and mentored experiences for underrepresented minorities in medical school and post-doctoral fellowships as a Career Mentor; member of the Bone Marrow Transplant Clinical Trials Network, Special Populations Committee member to highlight needs of under-represented minorities and a member of the Steering Committee for the ASBMT Survivorship Group, SIG with focus on minority populations. A member of the Nigerian Sickle Cell Disease Network (a charitable, non-profit organization to advance the understanding and management of sickle cell disease and improve the welfare of persons affected by this condition under the laws of Nigeria); and a member of the working group, of the Africa Sickle Cell Research Network (AfroSickleNet).