NEW HAVEN, CT, October 13, 2022 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Oliver Karam, MD, PhD, has been included in Marquis Who's Who. As in all Marquis Who's Who biographical volumes, individuals profiled are selected on the basis of current reference value. Factors such as position, noteworthy accomplishments, visibility, and prominence in a field are all taken into account during the selection process.
With more than 20 years of excellence to his credit in critical care medicine, Dr. Karam is a clinician, researcher and professor at Yale School of Medicine, where he focuses his efforts on providing care for the sickest children, while conducting clinical research and overseeing 14 faculty and six in-training fellows. Additionally, he helps grow the program by managing finances and collaborating with other entities in the hospital.
Prior to his current role, Dr. Karam began his career as a resident for the Geneva University Hospitals (Geneva, Switzerland) from 2002 to 2007. He then undertook a fellowship at CHU Sainte-Justine (Montreal, Canada) from 2007 to 2010, during which he was also a flight physician for Skyservice Business Aviation Inc. He subsequently served as an attending physician for Geneva University Hospitals from 2010 to 2017. Dr. Karam joined Virginia Commonwealth University (Richmond, Virginia) as an associate professor of pediatrics in 2017, and was promoted to professor in 2021. In addition, Dr. Karam was appointed chief of the Division of Pediatric Critical Care from 2019 to 2022, before joining Yale.
In parallel, Dr. Karam attained a Master of Science in clinical research from the University of Montreal in 2011 and a Doctor of Philosophy in critical care medicine from the University of Lille in France in 2017.
As part of his career, Dr. Karam has contributed a great deal of research to the field, including 150 peer-reviewed research studies as well as numerous presentations. Dr. Karam focuses his research on transfusion strategies in critically ill children, assessment of bleeding, and anticoagulation on extracorporeal life support. In a systematic review, he and his colleagues showed that, although there are numerous definitions related to bleeding's clinical significance, none are designed for critically ill children. They then used an internationally distributed survey to explore the perceived severity of bleeding in critically ill children. Dr. Karam and his team then designed an international consensus definition; with the help of 31 experts, he defined bleeding in critically ill children, which was the first definition to be validated in this specific population. These studies have allowed him to develop a new, operationalizable, bleeding definition that is now used in clinical studies. He has set the foundation for future studies, by establishing a consensus definition that is applicable to this patient population.
In addition, Dr. Karam is leading two research focuses within extracorporeal life support (ECLS). First, as the extracorporeal circuit is very pro-thrombotic, virtually all patients require anticoagulation, which puts patients at risk of bleeding. In a systematic review and meta-analysis, he has identified the optimal test to guide anticoagulation. He is now receiving highly competitive NIH funds to conduct a randomized controlled trial that will evaluate two platelet transfusion thresholds in children on ECLS. Second, although thousands of children are placed on ECLS during active cardiopulmonary resuscitation, the indications remain unclear. He has designed a score that should help identify ECLS' appropriate indications when the benefits outweigh the risks.
In recognition of his excellent work, Dr. Karam was recognized as the Best Poster at the International Symposium on Intensive Care and Emergency Medicine in 2009 and received an Excellence Award via the Canadian Clinical Research Society and Canadian Institutes for Health Research in 2010. His research was also lauded as the Best Research Project at the 2015 Swiss Pediatric Surgery Meeting and he was awarded Top Abstract by the Society for the Advancement of Blood Management and Best Research Abstract Award by the American Academy of Pediatrics, both in 2019. He was also honored with a Teaching Award by the University of Geneva in 2012 and by the Children's Hospital of Richmond in 2018.
Within the coming years, Dr. Karam plans to work toward improving the care on behalf of critically ill children through his research. His goal is to strengthen the team further, enabling them to provide the best possible care to their patients, both at Yale and around the world.
About Marquis Who's Who®
Since 1899, when A. N. Marquis printed the First Edition of Who's Who in America®, Marquis Who's Who® has chronicled the lives of the most accomplished individuals and innovators from every significant field of endeavor, including politics, business, medicine, law, education, art, religion and entertainment. Today, Who's Who in America® remains an essential biographical source for thousands of researchers, journalists, librarians and executive search firms around the world. Marquis® now publishes many Who's Who titles, including Who's Who in America®, Who's Who in the World®, Who's Who in American Law®, Who's Who in Medicine and Healthcare®, Who's Who in Science and Engineering®, and Who's Who in Asia®. Marquis® publications may be visited at the official Marquis Who's Who® website at www.marquiswhoswho.com.
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