Manu Varma

Manu was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease (renal dysplasia) at the age of 10 and received a living donor kidney transplant from his father at the age of 18. Over the last 20+ years as a young adult living with an organ transplant, he has been widely involved in the transplant community through volunteering with multiple organ procurement organizations (OPOs) to raise awareness of organ donation, as a camp counselor and later camp physician at Camp Sunshine in Casco, ME, as a board member of the Nephcure Foundation, and serving on committees for the United Network for Organ Sharing (UNOS) and the American Society of Nephrology.

Professionally, he is a pediatric heart failure and transplant cardiologist at NYU Langone Medical Center in New York after completing medical school, residency training in internal medicine and pediatrics, and fellowship training in pediatric cardiology and pediatric cardiomyopathy, heart failure, and transplantation. The majority of his work is in clinical care of pediatric heart transplant candidates and recipients; he also serves as a cardiology consultant for pediatric liver and kidney transplant patients, in a specialized clinic for patients with Fontan circulation, and as a general pediatric cardiologist. He looks forward to bringing the combination of lived experience as a transplant recipient and professional perspective as a transplant physician to the Transplant Families board and mission.