Prof. Mohamed Rela is one of the world’s most accomplished liver transplant surgeons and a pioneer in pediatric and adult liver transplantation. With over 6,000 successful transplants and decades of international experience across the UK, Europe, and India, he has transformed liver transplant accessibility in India. He is widely respected for innovation in split liver transplantation and complex hepatobiliary surgery. Under his leadership, Rela Hospital has evolved into a globally recognized quaternary care center for liver disease and transplantation.

Educational Qualifications:

• MBBS – 1982, University of Madras, India
• MS (General Surgery) – 1987, University of Madras, India
• FRCS – 1988, Royal College of Surgeons of Edinburgh, United Kingdom
• DSc (Honoris Causa) – 2013, The Tamil Nadu Dr. MGR Medical University, India

Professional Experience:

• Over 28+ years of experience in Liver Transplantation
• Performed more than 6,000 liver transplants
• Conducts 200+ robotic liver surgeries annually
• Performs 450+ complex hepatobiliary surgeries every year
• Founder – Institute of Liver Disease & Transplantation (2009), Chennai
• Established one of the largest liver transplant programs in India
• Founder – Rela Hospital, Chennai (International Quaternary Care Center)

Professional Memberships:

• The Transplantation Society (TTS)
• British Medical Association (BMA)
• Royal Society of Medicine (RSM)
• British Transplantation Society (BTS)
• International Liver Transplant Society (ILTS)
• Association of Upper GI Surgeons (AUGIS), UK
• European Society of Organ Transplantation (ESOT)
• British Association for the Study of the Liver (BASL)
• International Hepato-Pancreato-Biliary Association (IHPBA)
• Asian Pacific Association for the Study of the Liver (APASL)
• American Society of Transplantation (AST)

Major Achievements & Milestones:

• Guinness World Record (2000) – Successful liver transplant on a 5-day-old infant
• Pioneer of Split Liver Transplantation (one liver transplanted into two recipients)
• Published 400+ scientific papers (extensive academic contributions across transplant journals)
• Recognized among the most innovative pediatric surgeons globally
• Listed among leading liver surgeons worldwide

Leadership Positions:

• Chairman & Managing Director – Dr. Rela Hospital, Chennai
• President – Liver Transplant Society of India (LTSI)
• Councilor – The Transplantation Society (TTS), South/Southeast Asia
• Past President – International Liver Transplantation Society (ILTS)
• Executive Council Member – International Living Donor Liver Transplantation Group (iLDLT)
• Founder & Trustee – National Foundation for Liver Research (NFLR)
• Course Director – Post MCh Fellowship in Liver Transplantation, Dr. MGR Medical University

Reviewer For:

• Liver Transplantation (AASLD)
• British Journal of Surgery
• Transplant International (ESOT)
• Paediatric Transplantation
• HPB International
• Journal of Clinical & Experimental Hepatology
• Hepatology International (APASL)
• Annals of Surgery
• World Journal of Surgery
• Langenbeck’s Archives of Surgery
• International Journal of Nephrology
• Case Reports in Pathology

Awards & Recognitions:

• Panchanan Chatterjee Oration & Gold Medal – 1996
• Professor of Liver Surgery – King’s College London
• Scroll of Honour – JIPMER (2009)
• Dr. Madhanagopal Oration Medal – Madras Medical College (2010)
• Scroll of Honour – Dr. MGR Medical University (2012)
• Lifetime Achievement Award – AHPI at AHPICON 2024

Articles:

• Autoimmune Diseases: Types, Symptoms, Diagnosis, and Treatment
• Warning Signs of Pancreas Problems You Shouldn’t Ignore
• Immunosuppressants and Their Role in Organ Transplantation

Media:

• Rela Hospital Marks World Prematurity Day, Bringing Together Over 50 Preterm Babies and Families
• Rela Hospital Rolls Out Mobile Stroke Care Unit and Launches ‘New Beginnings’ Support Group
• Rela Hospital Launches India’s First Intestinal Rehabilitation Centre to Expand Treatment Horizons Beyond Transplantation.

Research & Publications:

• Lara Neves Souza, Rodrigo Bronze de Martino, Alberto Sanchez-Fueyo, Mohamed Rela, Anil Dhawan, John O’Grady, Nigel Heaton, Alberto Quaglia: Histopathology of 460 liver allografts removed at retransplantation: A shift in disease patterns over 27 years. Clinical Transplantation 02/2018;, DOI:10.1111/ctr.13227
• Michael Charlton, Josh Levitsky, Bashar Aqel, John O’Grady, Julie Hemibach, Mary RInella, Marwan Ghabril, Ray Thomason, Patrizia Burra, Ester Coelho Little, Marina Berenguer, Abraham Shaked, James Trotter, John Roberts, Manuel Rodriguez-Davalos, Mohamed Rela, Elizabeth Pomfret, Faouzi Saliba: International Liver Transplant Society Consensus Statement on IMMUNOSUPPRESSION IN LIVER TRANSPLANT RECIPIENTS. Transplantation 02/2018;, DOI:10.1097/TP.0000000000002147
• Trevor L. Nydam, Mettu Srinivas Reddy, Elizabeth A. Pomfret, Mohamed Rela: Progression of living liver donation worldwide. Current Opinion in Organ Transplantation 02/2018; 23(2):1., DOI:10.1097/MOT.0000000000000516
• Mayank Jain, Jayanthi Venkataraman, Joy Vargese, Mohamed Rela, mukul vij: A rare cause of gastrointestinal bleeding in the post-transplant setting. 11/2017; 3(4)., DOI:10.5114/ceh.2017.71447
• Mohamed Rela, Naresh P. Shanmugham: Accessible Pediatric Liver Transplantation in India: A Long way to go. Indian pediatrics 11/2017; 54(11):911-912., DOI:10.1007/s13312-017-1180-5
• Ashwin Rammohan, Sripriya Srinivas, Yahya Al-Azri, Srinivas M Reddy, Mohamed Rela: Restoring One Way Traffic Across the Roux Loop: The Nakajo Valve. 11/2017; 22(1)., DOI:10.14701/ahbps.2018.22.1.90
• Dinesh Jothimani, Ezhil Arasan, Vaibhav Patil, Mohamed Rela: Periscreen Strip Test—Rapid Diagnosis of Spontaneous Bacterial Peritonitis. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hepatology 07/2017; 7:S54., DOI:10.1016/j.jceh.2017.05.102
• Sanjay Govil, Ashwin Rammohan,Sandeep Rajasekar, Mohamed Rela: Should the A2ALL Definition of Early Allograft Dysfunction (EAD) Replace Dahm Criteria for Small-for-Size Dysfunction (SFSD) as the Outcome Predictor after Adult LDLT. Transplantation 05/2017; 101(5S2):128.
• Ashwin Rammohan, Mettu S Reddy, Naresh Shanmugam, Ilankumaran Kaliamoorthy, Gomathy Narasimhan, Venugopal Kota, Mohamed Rela: Auxiliary Partial Orthotopic Liver Transplantation (APOLT): No Longer Stepping through the Looking Glass?. Transplantation 05/2017; 101(5S2):25.
• Ashwin Rammohan, Mettu S Reddy, Mohammed Safwan, Gomathy Narasimhan, Sanjay Govil, Venugopal Kota, Mohamed Rela: Factors Predicting Readmission Following Deceased and Live Donor Liver Transplantation. Transplantation 05/2017; 101(5S2):242.
• Ashwin Rammohan, Mettu S Reddy, Mohammed Safwan, Gomathy Narasimhan, Sanjay Govil, Venugopal Kota, Mohamed Rela: Pattern & Impact of Readmissions following Deceased & Live Donor Liver Transplantation.
• Uday A. Sanglodkar, Dinesh Jothimani, Mohamed Rela: Hemospray for Recurrent Oesophageal Band Ulcer Bleeding. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hepatology 07/2017; 7:S95., DOI:10.1016/j.jceh.2017.05.171
• Lekshmi Kalinathan, Ruba Soundar Kathavarayan, Dinakaran Nagendram, Mukul Vij, Mohamed Rela: Segmentation of hepatocellular carcinoma and dysplastic liver tumors in histopathology images using area based adaptive expectation maximization. Multimedia Tools and Applications 01/2017;, DOI:10.1007/s11042-016-4260-y
• Shanmugam N, Valamparampil JJ, Scott JX, Vij M, Narasimhan G, Reddy MS, RelaM. Complete remission of refractory hepatoblastoma after liver transplantation ina child with sorafenib monotherapy: A new hope? Pediatr Blood Cancer. 2017Dec;64(12). doi: 10.1002/pbc.26701. Epub 2017 Jul 11. PubMed PMID: 28696063.
• Rammohan A, Reddy MS, Farouk M, Vargese J, Rela M. Pembrolizumab forMetastatic Hepatocellular Carcinoma Following Live Donor Liver Transplantation:The Silver Bullet? Hepatology. 2017 Oct 10. doi: 10.1002/hep.29575. [Epub aheadof print] PubMed PMID: 29023959.
• Rela M, Reddy MS. Pediatric Liver Transplantation: An Asymmetrical War for Access to Livers. Gastroenterology. 2017 Oct;153(4):888-889. doi:10.1053/j.gastro.2017.08.054. Epub 2017 Sep 1. PubMed PMID: 28867276.
• Maiwall R, Sarin SK, Kumar S, Jain P, Kumar G, Bhadoria AS, Moreau R,Kedarisetty CK, Abbas Z, Amarapurkar D, Bhardwaj A, Bihari C, Butt AS, Chan A,Chawla YK, Chowdhury A, Dhiman R, Dokmeci AK, Ghazinyan H, Hamid SS, Kim DJ,Komolmit P, Lau GK, Lee GH, Lesmana LA, Jamwal K, Mamun-Al-Mahtab, Mathur RP,Nayak SL, Ning Q, Pamecha V, Alcantara-Payawal D, Rastogi A, Rahman S, Rela M, Saraswat VA, Shah S, Shiha G, Sharma BC, Sharma MK, Sharma K, Tan SS, Chandel SS,Vashishtha C, Wani ZA, Yuen MF, Yokosuka O, Duseja A, Jafri W, Devarbhavi H,Eapen CE, Goel A, Sood A, Ji J, Duan Z, Chen Y; of the APASL ACLF ResearchConsortium (AARC) working party. Development of predisposition, injury, response, organ failure model for predicting acute kidney injury in acute on chronic liver failure. Liver Int. 2017 Oct;37(10):1497-1507. doi: 10.1111/liv.13443. Epub 2017 Aug 2. PubMed PMID: 28393476.
• Ramana Ramya J, Thanigai Arul K, Epple M, Giebel U, Guendel-Graber J, Jayanthi V, Sharma M, Rela M, Narayana Kalkura S. Chemical and structural analysis of gallstones from the Indian subcontinent. Mater Sci Eng C Mater Biol Appl. 2017 Sep 1;78:878-885. doi: 10.1016/j.msec.2017.04.004. Epub 2017 Apr 11. PubMed PMID: 28576062.
• Rajakumar A, Kaliamoorthy I, Rela M, Mandell MS. Small-for-Size Syndrome: Bridging the Gap Between Liver Transplantation and Graft Recovery. Semin Cardiothorac Vasc Anesth. 2017 Sep;21(3):252-261. doi: 10.1177/1089253217699888. Epub 2017 Mar 23. PubMed PMID: 28758559.
• Reddy MS, Kaliamoorthy I, Rajakumar A, Malleeshwaran S, Appuswamy E, Lakshmi S, Varghese J, Rela M. Double-blind randomized controlled trial of the routine perioperative use of terlipressin in adult living donor liver transplantation. Liver Transpl. 2017 Aug;23(8):1007-1014. doi: 10.1002/lt.24759. Epub 2017 Jun 29. PubMed PMID: 28294557.