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Professor
MD Anderson
Disclosure(s): Karius: Advisor/Consultant, Grant/Research Support
Dr Roy Chemaly is a tenured Professor of Medicine in the Department of Infectious Diseases, Infection Control & Employee Health at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. Dr. Chemaly completed his training in infectious diseases and medical microbiology at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation in Cleveland, Ohio. He is board-certified in internal medicine/infectious diseases, medical quality, and medical microbiology.
During his fellowship, Dr. Chemaly completed a master’s degree in public health from Northeastern Ohio Universities in Rootstown, Ohio. In addition to Dr. Chemaly’s clinical research work in virology and multi-drug resistant organisms, he is the Chief Infection Control Officer at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, the chair of the Infection Control Committee, and the past chair of the Quality and Safety Council of the Division of Internal Medicine. In addition, he is one of the founding member and past-chair of the Transplant Infectious Diseases Special Interest Group of the American Society of Transplant and Cellular Therapy (ASTCT).
Dr Chemaly devoted his career studying viral infections in immunocompromised patients, specifically those undergoing hematopoietic cell transplantation (HCT) for hematologic malignancies. He published extensively on mechanisms to treat and prevent viral infections in this population. During his tenure at MD Anderson Cancer Center, he established the clinical virology research program and assembled a research team that conducts phase II and phase III clinical trials for new antiviral drugs, desperately needed for our immunocompromised patients, in addition to PI-initiated trials and lab protocols. He led and successfully completed more than 20 international and national clinical trials and several studies focusing on diagnosis and management of viral infections; data from which have been presented nationally and internationally with subsequent publications in high-impact journals. Dr. Chemaly has distinguished himself as an outstanding research leader of infectious diseases. He has produced high quality research which has had a great impact on preventing and appropriately managing infections (particularly viral infections) in immunocompromised patients. Dr. Chemaly’s work has been reported in numerous peer-reviewed journals including New England Journal of Medicine, Blood, Journal of Infectious Diseases, and Clinical Infectious Diseases.
Furthermore, Dr Chemaly is well known on the national and international stages as an expert in clinical and translational virology in immunocompromised hosts. He contributed in writing and updating the practice guidelines for respiratory viruses, including SARS-CoV-2, in leukemia and HCT and Cellular Therapy patients for two major professional societies; the ASTCT, as well as the European Congress for Infectious Complications in Leukemia-8 (ECIL-8). Furthermore, he was elected as a co-chair of the Infection & Immune Reconstitution Working Committee of the ASTCT/CIBMTR in 2019 and as a member of the international CMV Forum that includes representation from the FDA, EMA, experts from national and international academic centers, and industry. Finally, Dr Chemaly was elected as an executive member on the council for the International Immunocompromised Host Society (ICHS) and the chair for the working group on respiratory viruses (ESGREV) of the European Society for Clinical Microbiology and Infectious Diseases (ESCMID).