Surfing the MASH Tsunami

Send us Fan Mail In June, the Fatty Liver Foundation officially launched the Stephen A. Harrison Patient Advocacy program and announced its first class of 20 Fellows. In today's conversation, the program's organizers, Fatty Liver Foundation President Wayne Eskridge and Program Co-ordinator Elena Samsonova, share the program's goals and objectives with Louise Campbell and Roger Green. The bulk of this conversation focuses on the program's goals and scope for its first year. First, thou...

Send us Fan Mail In June, the Fatty Liver Foundation officially launched the Stephen A. Harrison Patient Advocacy program and announced its first class of 20 Fellows. In today's conversation, Louise Campbell and Roger Green interview the founders to learn what motivated them to launch this program, and we meet five of the initial Fellows. Program Co-ordinator Elena Samsonova opens the conversation by celebrating last week's onboarding of 20 inaugural Fellows and the chemistry between th...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 14 Louise Campbell and Roger Green interview key players in the inaugural Dr. Stephen A. Harrison Patient Advocacy Fellowship program, including Wayne Eskridge of the Fatty Liver Foundation (FLF), which initiated the program, Program Coordinator Elena Samsonova, and five Harrison Fellows. 00:05:08 - Part I: How the Harrison Fellowship Came To Be Elena opens by celebrating last week's onboarding of 20 inaugural Fellows and the chemistry b...

Send us Fan Mail This discussion on ways to improve MASH patient management comes from the early July roundtable on "Major Issues of the First Six Months of 2025." As a reminder, that roundtable included the three co-hosts (Louise, Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green) Roger drives this conversation, focusing on two very different, yet very important issues: the first is the increasing dynamism of the in-office scanning market, with leader Echosens developing new products and services, w...

Send us Fan Mail Last month, The Lancet posted online an article from Stine Johansen, Fredrik Åberg, Emmanuel Tsochatzis and Aleksander Krag, titled "Screening for Advanced Liver Disease." The article aims to update the Wilson and Jungner criteria, initially developed in 1960, to address modern needs and issues. In this conversation, Professor Krag and Dr. Johansen join Roger Green to discuss their article. There are many nuances and high points to cover in this thoughtful, fairly lengt...

Send us Fan Mail This discussion on ways to improve MASH patient management comes from the early July roundtable on "Major Issues of the First Six Months of 2025." As a reminder, that roundtable included the three co-hosts (Louise, Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green) Louise drives this conversation based on two related issues she sees emerging: (i) increasing opportunities for motivated patients to manage their own health and (ii) managing the total patient in an environment where people...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 13 Louise Campbell, Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green continue their discussion of some major issues from earlier this year, while co-authors Aleksander Krag and Stine Johanset join Roger to discuss their recent publication in The Lancet, titled "Screening for Advanced Liver Disease." 00:04:45 - Major Issues of the First Six Months: Integrated Patient Management Louise drives this conversation based on two related issues she ...

Send us Fan Mail Key Opinion Leaders Manal Abdelmalek, Naim Alkhouri, Scott Isaacs and Zobair Younossi join Roger Green to discuss the FDA's approval of semaglutide for patients with non-cirrhotic MASH. This conversation centers on the roles that new technologies and an expanded APP population will play in MASLD and MASH management in the US, and concludes by exploring how care might look different 12 months from now, and then in subsequent years. As panelists identify some of the chang...

Send us Fan Mail Key Opinion Leaders Manal Abdelmalek, Naim Alkhouri, Scott Isaacs and Zobair Younossi join Roger Green to discuss the FDA's approval of semaglutide for patients with non-cirrhotic MASH. This conversation focuses on how the US healthcare system must adapt to handle the growing number of MASH and MASLD patients who might seek treatment, given likely increases in publicity and education. The conversation starts with a focus on the implications of semaglutide approval for hepatol...

Send us Fan Mail Key Opinion Leaders Manal Abdelmalek, Naim Alkhouri, Scott Isaacs and Zobair Younossi join Roger Green to discuss FDA's approval of semaglutide for patients with non-cirrhotic MASH. This conversation focuses on benefits for patients and ways that having two drugs with different modes of action will change pharmacotherapy choices. This conversation starts with the group describing the sense of "enthusiasm" and "fulfillment" hepatology drug developers feel to see two drug...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up, Season 6, Episode 12 This week's episode is a special three-part roundtable on the implications of the FDA's recent approval of semaglutide. Naim Alkhouri, Manal Abdelmalek, Scott Isaacs and Zobair Younossi join Roger Green in a discussion that focuses less on specifics of pharmacotherapy and more on how having two drugs available will change MASH management in the US. 00:08:45 - Part I: How Will The Semaglutide Approval Affect Patient Treatment and Phar...

Send us Fan Mail This week's expert interview is with Dr. Emily Andaya, Medical Director of the Cardiovascular Program at Major Health Partners of Shelbyville, IN. She joins Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss the American Heart Assocation's CKM initiative, why she believe it should be titled "CKLM" for liver, and how including liver in the CKM scoring system would make it stronger and provide a more robust tool to help improve patients' health. Emily begins by discussing her att...

Send us Fan Mail Multi-Metabolic Week focuses on the idea that MASLD and MASH are elements in a systemic set of Multi-Metabolic issues. This conversation is the second of two looking at the concept of the "Multi-Metabolic Clinic," a clinic that treats the entire spectrum of multi-metabolic diseases. This conversation starts by focusing on how the two clinics train other physicians and practices on multi-metabolic issues. The EDOM clinic in Spain is certified to provide nutritional training to...

Send us Fan Mail Multi-Metabolic Week focuses on the idea that MASLD and MASH are elements in a systemic set of Multi-Metabolic issues. This conversation is the first of two looking at the concept of the "Multi-Metabolic Clinic," a clinic that treats the entire spectrum of multi-metabolic diseases. The core of this episode starts during the weekly groundbreaker exercise, during which our guests began to describe the path that brought them from single-disease specialization to the broade...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6, Episode 11 This week, we modify our usual episode structure to focus on multi-metabolic practices and constructs. The multi-metabolic practices covered this week are run by non-hepatologists who have chosen to focus on the liver in a broader cardiometabolic context. They include two practices discussed during a two-part roundtable, one run by US gastroenterologist Dr. Karen Jerome-Zapadka and the EDOM practice in Spain, run by endocrinolo...

Send us Fan Mail This week's expert is Tim Jobson, Medical Director of Predictive Health Intelligence, a UK-based consultancy. Tim joins Louise Campbell and Roger Green to share an update on PHI's Somerset UK project and other activities. The Somerset pilot was designed to help the NHS identify untreated patients at high risk for liver disease and bring them to the office for screening. Tim describes hepatoSIGHT, a tool that "allows clinicians to get their hands on the data and to find ...

Send us Fan Mail Roger Green talks with LiverRight CEO Brandon Tudor and Chief Medical Officer Alexander Lalos about the launch of LiverRight, America's first virtual hepatology clinic, which has recently begun treating patients. Brandon starts the conversation by telling the story of how he and his partner, Pete Celano, started LiverRight: they saw liver disease as a growing disease in a medical system that was ill-equipped to provide front-line care. When the two men "secret shopped" gettin...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the first segment of SurfingMASH’s July discussion of key events from the first six months of 2025. Co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green each chose one topic of personal interest. Today, Jörn Schattenberg discusses two recent papers that demonstrate differences in how individual patients respond to different proteomic tests and what this can mean for individualized treatment plans. Jörn begins by citing Modulation of meg...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00 - Surf's Up 6.10.1 This conversation covers three topics. Jörn Schattenberg discusses two papers that suggest an exciting role NITs might play in future prescribing decisions, two executives from LiverRight describe the U.S.'s first virtual liver clinic, and Tom Jobson of Predictive Health Intelligence updates us on how simple analyses of large data bases can identify and motivate high-risk liver patients to visit their doctors. 00:17:30 - Roundtable: NITs might h...

Send us Fan Mail Hepatologist and hepatology key opinion leader Naim Alkhouri joins Roger Green to remember his longstanding relationship with Stephen Harrison, announce his new role as Chief Academic Officer at Summit Clinical Research and share how, in this role, he will have exciting new avenues make an impact on many elements of MASH drug development and patient care. The conversation can be divided into two sections. In the first, Naim recounts his relationship with Stephen Harriso...

Send us Fan Mail Fatty Liver Alliance President Mike Betel joins Roger Green to discuss his recent completion of the 3rd Annual Glucose Challenge, an event every July where Mike wears a continuous glucose monitor (CGM) device for a month, conducts food experiments, tracks glucose levels and shares all results with his LinkedIn and FattyLiver.ca friends and followers. The conversation starts with Mike sharing the history of the Glucose Challenge. Over its first three years, it has evolve...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the third and final segment of SurfingMASH’s July discussion of #SLDThinkTank 2025. In addition to co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green, panelists include Dr. Kristina Curtis of Applied Behaviour Change, a UK-based consultancy. Louise begins this conversation by highlighting the low level of correct information (and, frequently, high level of passionately-held misinformation) that adults have about diet and her success in impr...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Episode 6.9 This conversation covers three topics. The first discusses the challenges of behavior change in dietary habits and ways governments can help, the second looks at what one can learn from wearing a CGM for 30 days, and the third celebrates the late Stephen Harrison while looking into the future of clinical trials and medical education. 00:06:12 - Global Think-Tank on SLD Roundtable, Part 3 Behavior consultant Dr. Kristina Curtis joins Jör...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the fourth and final segment of SurfingMASH’s April discussion of drug development in memory of Stephen A. Harrison. In addition to co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green, panelists include hepatologist and key opinion leader Sven Francque. The discussion focuses on PPARs, genetic medicines, and other emerging drug classes while considering the idea that drug therapies can have an impact on the liver independent of their effect ...

Send us Fan Mail Global Liver Institute President and CEO Larry Holden joins Roger Green to discuss recent Washington political and regulatory activities, their potential impact on the liver community, and ways we can respond. Larry starts by acknowledging that we are in for "dark times" under the current administration and describes some current government actions that are causing major setbacks, as well as others that have the potential to do so. Specifically, he details the challenges caus...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the second segment of SurfingMASH's coverage of the Global Think Tank on Steatotic Liver Diseases (#SLDThinkTank2025) held in Barcelona in June. It focuses on the kinds of feedback most likely to produce successful behavioral interventions. The conversation begins with Jörn discussing the Liver Screen Study, a "very ambitious effort" that starts with 30,000 members of the general European population, narrows down to a subgroup with liver disea...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00 - Surf's Up, Season 6 Episode 8 The conversation addresses three issues that are distinct, yet each is pivotal to the future of MASLD and MASH therapies. The first, from the Global Think-Tank on Steatotic Liver Disease, considers how personal and digital approaches can be combined to form the most effective strategy for patient management. In the second, Global Liver Institute President and CEO Larry Holden joins Roger Green to discuss the new challenges in Washington s...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the third segment of SurfingMASH’s April discussion of drug development in memory of Stephen A. Harrison. In addition to co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green, panelists include hepatologists and key opinion leaders Sven Francque and Naim Alkhouri. Louise starts the discussion by asking when a patient is metabolically and hepatically healthy instead of merely driving weight loss. She notes that basing therapy entirely on weight...

Send us Fan Mail This week's newsmaker, Dutch Liver Patients Association President Jose Willemse, joins Roger Green to discuss the patient screening program at this year's EASL Congress, which took place in Amsterdam, and the general idea of what constitutes a patient-sensitive dialogue. Jose describes the phenomenal level of interest in the screening activity, in which hepatologists and APPs scanned 400 people per day for MASLD and MASH. Boosted by significant mass publicity in Amsterd...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the opening segment of SurfingMASH's coverage of the Global Think Tank on Steatotic Liver Diseases (#SLDThinkTank2025) held in Barcelona in June. Co-hosts Louise Campbell and Roger Green are joined by Dr. Kristina Curtis, Managing Director of Applied Behaviour Change, a UK-based consultancy. This discussion starts with co-host Jörn Schattenberg discussing the history and evolution of the first four Global Think-Tanks as the focus shifts ...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 7 Host Roger Green explains our recent vacation from publishing episodes, assures the audience that the podcast will continue weekly for months and years ahead, and discusses the episode's sections, covering the Global Think-Tank on Steatotic Liver Disease (SLD), the EASL patient screening activity and the increasing role of NITs in drug development. While introducing roundtable guests, he introduces first-time Surfer Dr. Kristina Curtis...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 Surf's Up, Season 6, Episode 6. On April 23, 2024, our colleague and co-founder, Stephen Harrison, passed away suddenly. This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami remembers Stephen with two of his closest associates and continues our annual MASH Drug Development roundtable held in his honor. 00:00:04:24 - A Deep Dive into Drug Development, Part 2 The second portion of the Drug Development roundtable primarily focuses on three key issues. The first, uptake of resmetir...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the opening segment of SurfingMASH's April discussion, in memory of Stephen A. Harrison, on drug development. In addition to co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green, panelists include hepatologists and key opinion leaders Sven Francque and Naim Alkhouri. This opening discussion focuses on exciting advances in one drug class (FGF-21s) and, more broadly, on exploring ways to treat cirrhosis. As Naim points out in his opening commen...

Send us Fan Mail This week’s expert, Hepatologist and Key Opinion Leader Scott Friedman, joins Roger to discuss advances in acceptance of gene therapy and knowledge in other areas of basic liver science. When discussing science, he pays particular attention to findings on the diversity of stellate cells and his interest in CAR-T as a therapy for liver disease. This conversation starts with Scott discussing gene therapy. Specifically, he applauds the idea that gene therapy is becoming ac...

Send us Fan Mail This weekend’s Newsmaker, Indiana University hepatologist and key opinion leader Naga Chalasani, joins Roger Green to discuss Early Experience with Resmetirom To Treat Metabolic-Associated Steatohepatitis with Fibrosis in a Real-World Setting, an article his group published recently in Hepatology Communications. He shares highlights from the paper and points out the one key area in which his group found room for improvement in their initial protocol. Naga and colleagues...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 5 Host Roger Green briefly describes this episode’s three sections and introduces Roundtable guests. The Roundtable panel shares groundbreakers. 00:10:39 - Roundtable: A Deep Dive Into Drug Development, Part One The opening portion of this month's roundtable centers around two issues: exciting data for FGF-21s and, more generally, treating patients with cirrhosis. Naim Alkhouri sets the tone in his opening comments, which start by ...

Send us Fan Mail This week's expert, Hepatologist and Key Opinion Leader Mazen Noureddin, joins Roger to discuss major advances in drug development over the past year. He covers a range of different drug classes, focusing on stages of development and the range of options within each class. First, Mazen discusses a tremendously exciting group of FGF-21 agents, specifically mentioning Akero Therapeutics's efruxifermin, 89bio's pegozafermin, and Boston Pharmaceuticals's efimosfermin. He po...

Send us Fan Mail This weekend's Newsmaker, Fatty Liver Alliance Founder Mike Betel, joins Roger Green to discuss the wide range of conferences where he has been invited to speak or sit on a panel this year. Specifically, he shares his belief on what this says about interest in MASLD and describes the messages he delivers at the conferences he attends. The interview starts with Roger asking about the benefits societies and the broader community get from having Mike at these programs. As ...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation is the concluding segment of SurfingMASH's coverage of the AASLD Emerging Trends Conference on the SLD Spectrum diseases: MASLD, MetALD and ALD. In addition to co-hosts Louise Campbell and Roger Green, panelists include EASL Secretary General Aleksander Krag, hepatologist Alex Lalos and Jenn Leigh Jones, Founder of the Society for Sober Livers Survival patient advocacy group. The conversation starts with Roger questioning whether it is a good or bad id...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 4 Surfing the MASH Tsunami concludes its coverage of the AASLD Emerging Trends Conference on MASLD, MetALD and ALD. This week, the panelists focus on pivotal messages that attendees took away from the conference and what messages they would like to share with listeners. Our newsmaker, Fatty Liver Alliance and CEO Mike Betel, discusses the lessons he has taken from being invited to a far wider swath of conferences this year and shar...

Send us Fan Mail This week's Expert is Jeff McIntyre, Vice President, Liver Programs at the Global Liver Institute. His major topic is how recent high-level FDA job cuts might affect MASH drug and diagnostics development. He also shares reactions to FibroSIGHT, HistoIndex's new digital pathology service for clinical practice. Highlight: Recent job cuts at the FDA will produce chaos in government and slow response to any emerging crises. Second Highlight: Patient self-advocacy becomes ev...

Send us Fan Mail This week's newsmaker, Yukti Choudhury, Director of Clinical Development at HistoIndex, joins Roger Green to discuss FibroSIGHT, a new HistoIndex service that allows clinicians to use HistoIndex's Second Harmonic Generation (SHG) technology and analytics to determine specific CRN fibrosis level for patients with inconclusive NIT results. One reason FibroSIGHT is worthy of attention: This is the first time an in-depth analysis of clinical trial biopsy results is being p...

Send us Fan Mail Surfing the MASH Tsunami continues its coverage of the AASLD Emerging Trends Conference on MASLD, MetALD and ALD. This week, the panelists focus on what studies on bariatric surgery and drugs in development can tell us about future treatment and explore some clinical trial questions. Guest Surfers include Professor Aleksander Krag of the University of Southern Denmark, the current Secretary-General of EALS, hepatologist Alexander Lalos of Robert Wood Johnson hospital, a...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 3 Surfing the MASH Tsunami continues its coverage of the AASLD Emerging Trends Conference on MASLD, MetALD and ALD. This week, the panelists focus on what studies on bariatric surgery and drugs in development can tell us about future treatment and explore some clinical trial questions. Our newsmaker, HistoIndex Director of Clinical Development Yukti Choudhury, introduces us to FibroSIGHT, which provides clinicians with highly precise bio...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 6 Episode 2 Surfing the MASH Tsunami continues its coverage of the AASLD Emerging Trends Conference on MASLD, MetALD and ALD. This week, the panelists focus on disease epidemiology and what it can teach us about the relative importance of alcohol and diet on disease progression. Our newsmaker, hepatology KOL and frequent Surfer Hannes Hagstrom, discusses what a recent paper demonstrates about the impact of MASLD on 15-year mortality and cause of d...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up! Season 6 Episode 1 SurfingMASH kicks off our sixth season in our new format, with three major elements to each episode. This week's Roundtable and Newsmakers segments focused on two recent conferences that took a multispecialty perspective on the range of medical and psychological issues affecting steatotic liver disease (a new concept specialty: steatology.") Our Expert this week is our co-host Jörn Schattenberg, discussing the educational and conceptua...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naim Alkhouri, Mike Betel, Michelle Long and Jeff McIntyre join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to look back at The Liver Meeting 2024. This conversation reviews two sessions promoting healthy livers and asks panelists what they anticipate for #TLM2025. This last conversation starts with Jeff describing the session that moved him most and praising a panel that Mike co-chaired on Lifestyle Management of MASLD and MASH. Jeff spoke on this panel, and he desc...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naim Alkhouri, Mike Betel, Michelle Long and Jeff McIntyre join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to look back at The Liver Meeting 2024. This conversation considers the role of patient advocacy in replacing biopsy in clinical trials with NITs and reviews a session on the foundational principles for patien-centric clinical trials. This conversation picks up at the end of Michelle's discussion of the FDA Corner session. Jeff starts by identifying this specif...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naim Alkhouri, Mike Betel, Michelle Long and Jeff McIntyre join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to look back at The Liver Meeting 2024. This conversation reviews the late-breaker presentation on efimosermin, a q4w FGF-21 agent and the "FDA Corner" session. Jörn begins the discussion by highlighting a paper from the later breaker session on efimosfermin alfa, an FGF-21 agent dosed q4w. He notes that after only six doses (24 weeks), efimosfermin alfa d...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naim Alkhouri, Mike Betel, Michelle Long and Jeff McIntyre join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to look back at The Liver Meeting 2024. This conversation considers how the anticipated approval of a second MASH drug without biopsy might affect clinical trials and discusses two recent publications on patient genotyping and patient clusters. The conversation starts with Roger asking the group whether the presence of two approved MASH medications that do not ...

Send us Fan Mail In this episode, Naim Alkhouri, Mike Betel, Michelle Long and Jeff McIntyre join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to look back at The Liver Meeting 2024. This conversation reviews the ESSENCE trial, the Phase 3 trial demonstrating that semaglutide regresses fibrosis levels in some MASH patients. The conversation begins with each panelist sharing a word or short phrase they felt best captured their feelings about TLM2024. Next, panelists review the meeting's most cons...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 – Surf’s Up: Season 5 Episode 26 - Last month, close to 8,000 hepatology stakeholders convened in San Diego for The Liver Meeting 2024. Hepatology Key Opinion Leader Naim Alkhouri, Novo Nordisk International Vice President for Medicines Michelle Long, and patient advocates Jeff McIntyre from the Global Liver Institute and Michael Betel from the Fatty Liver Alliance join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss highlights. 00:03:23 - Introduction and Groundbreak...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 25 On July 20, Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology released the paper, Expert Panel Recommendations: Practical Clinical Applications for Initiating and Monitoring Resmetirom in Patients with MASH/NASH and Moderate to non-cirrhotic Advanced Fibrosis. Corresponding author Maru Rinella joins the Surfers to share key points from the recommendations and offer her thoughts on what lay behind them. 00:02:26 - Introduction and Groundbreak...

Send us Fan Mail Two weeks ago, the SurfingMASH Question of the Week asked, "What structural or educational changes do you anticipate will significantly improve Provider-Patient communication? Will these changes require more from the provider and more from the patient?" Today, S5 E23 panelists Mike Betel and José Willemse join Roger Green to review the three answers we received. Of the three questions from audience members, one from a patient/patient advocate suggested greater honesty,...

Send us Fan Mail In the second half of Roger Green's interview with Global Liver Institute Vice President, Liver Programs Jeff McIntyre, Jeff discusses the implications of his key EASL Congress takeaways for GLI and other patient advocacy groups. To Jeff, this trend makes patient advocates a more valuable player in the clinical trial design process, particularly when coupled with the FDA's increasing focus on diversity in trial populations. This will become particularly important beca...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation contains the first half of Roger Green's interview with Global Liver Institute Vice President, Liver Programs Jeff McIntyre, during which the two discuss what Jeff considered the key strategic takeaways for GLI from the various EASL Congress presentations, abstracts and discussions. Jeff focuses on the "overriding sense of optimism" coming from the multiple pieces of positive drug data. He cites the data on Boehringer Ingelheim's survodutide, the foll...

Send us Fan Mail In the second half of Roger Green's interview with PharmaNest Founder and CEO Mathieu Petitjean, Matt discusses the implications of his key EASL Congress takeaways for PharmaNest. Matt starts this discussion with a simple question: Will biopsy-based analyses become part of a surrogate endpoint? As he points out, they are not today, and creating the necessary data might require a significant effort. If not, they are unlikely to remain relevant to the large, Phase 3 tri...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation contains the first half of Roger Green's interview with PharmaNest Founder and CEO Mathieu Petitjean. After Matt tells the audience a little about his background and PhramaNest, the two discuss what Matt considered the key strategic takeaways for PharmaNest from the various EASL Congress presentations, abstracts and discussions. Before answering the question, Matt describes the core services his company offers: "PharmaNest specializes in digital patho...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 24 This week's episode on MASLD lessons from the EASL Congress 2024 includes three separate elements: individual interviews with PharmaNext Founder and CEO Mathieu Petitjean and Global Liver Institute Vice President of Liver Programs Jeff McIntyre, followed by a discussion with patient advocates Mike Betel of the Fatty Liver Alliance and José Willemse from the Netherlands, now supporting EASL. 00:02:45 - Introduction R...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami looks back on interviews Roger Green conducted during the EASL Congress itself. This conversation with SurfingMASH co-host and Tawazun Health Founder and Clinical Director Louise Campbell took place on the last day of the Congress This portion of the conversation was not included in the original S5 E19 but instead was reserved for a special conversation at a later time (now). The specific focus of this conversation is on how practice patte...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami looks back on interviews Roger Green conducted during the EASL Congress itself. This conversation with Hepatology Key Opinion Leader and EASL Educational Councillor Sven Francque took place 90 minutes after the EASL Congress closed. The discussion focuses on plans and hopes for the future, both the future of MASLD diagnosis and treatment and of the EASL Congress itself. The conversation starts with Sven discussing all the positive energy ...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami looks back on interviews Roger Green conducted during the EASL Congress itself. This conversation with SurfingMASH co-host and Tawazun Health Founder and Clinical Director Louise Campbell took place on the last day of the Congress. This conversation centered on three major topics addressed at the EASL Congress, each of which made Louise "quite enthusiastic." The first of these was the presentation of the new EASL/EASD/EASO Clinical Practic...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami looks back on interviews Roger Green conducted during the EASL Congress itself. This conversation with SurfingMASH co-host and Tawazun Health Founder and Clinical Director Louise Campbell took place on the first day of the Congress. Roger's first interview with Louise took place at the end of Thursday, the opening day of the formal Congress and the first day of research presentations and posters. She starts by describing the "really nice v...

Send us Fan Mail This week, Surfing the MASH Tsunami looks back on interviews Roger Green conducted during the EASL Congress itself. This conversation with Fatty Liver Alliance Founder and CEO Mike Betel took place Wednesday of Congress week, a day for special sections and industry presentations, but one day before the General Session opened. The first part of the conversation centered on the Patient Advocate session that Mike chaired with Shira Zelber-Sagi. (This is the focus of Seaso...

Send us Fan Mail This week’s vault comes from our first episode with Shira Zelber-Sagi. She and Ken Cusi joined us during US Thanksgiving Week 2022 to discuss nutrition and behavioral issues related to MASLD. The episode’s original writeup explains: Surfing the MASH Tsunami hosts its first episode dedicated to nutrition and NASH with distinguished guest, Prof. Shira Zelber-Sagi. Alongside this rich discussion are Ken Cusi, Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green. This final conver...

Send us Fan Mail Co-chairs Shira Zelber-Sagi and Mike Betel and panelists Tom Marjot and José Willemse, all from the EASL Congress session "Patient Experiences in Clinical Settings," join Louise Campbell to the need for resources that allow MASLD patients to access shared experience programs and holistic MASLD support programs. This final conversation focuses on shared experience and holistic MASLD support programs. It starts with Tom suggesting that shared experience is a pivotal fact...

Send us Fan Mail Co-chairs Shira Zelber-Sagi and Mike Betel and panelists Tom Marjot and José Willemse, all from the EASL Congress session "Patient Experiences in Clinical Settings," join Louise Campbell to discuss ways that socioeconomic and psychological issues impact the dynamic of the physician-patient consult, and, as a result, often patient adherence to therapy. This conversation starts with Shira asking Tom whether he addresses diet with his patients and, more importantly, whether he ...

Send us Fan Mail Co-chairs Shira Zelber-Sagi and Mike Betel and panelists Tom Marjot and José Willemse, all from the EASL Congress session "Patient Experiences in Clinical Settings," join Louise Campbell to discuss strategies and questioning styles that can improve the dynamic of the physician-patient consult. This conversation starts with Tom stating that having multidisciplinary treatment teams would provide tremendous benefits in terms of being prepared for patients and fully responsive t...

Send us Fan Mail Co-chairs Shira Zelber-Sagi and Mike Betel and panelists Tom Marjot and José Willemse, all from the EASL Congress session "Patient Experiences in Clinical Settings," join Louise Campbell to discuss some of the key dynamics shaping the physician-patient consult. This conversation starts with Mike asking Tom whether he reviews the patient's history before the visit. Tom says he does so because he considers preparation vital to a successful consult. That said, Tom notes the imp...

Send us Fan Mail Co-chairs Shira Zelber-Sagi and Mike Betel and panelists Tom Marjot and José Willemse, all from the EASL Congress session "Patient Experiences in Clinical Settings," join Louise Campbell to provide an overview of issues in physician-patient communication. The conversation itself has two elements. It starts with first-time surfers Tom Marjot and José Willemse introducing themselves to listeners. After that, Shira starts by discussing the EASL Congress session with...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 23 During SurfingMASH's wrap-up interviews from the EASL Congress (S5 E19), Louise Campbell and Mike Betel mentioned a session Mike co-chaired on challenges in provider-patient communications. Today, the other co-chair, Shira Zelber-Sagi and panelists Tom Marjot and Jose Willemse join Louise and Mike to return to this topic. 00:13:34 - Discussing the EASL Congress session Shira describes EASL Patient Synergies, a broad collabora...

Send us Fan Mail In this week's episode, Jeff Lazarus discusses the idea that the MASH community, including patient advocates, live in a "bit of a bubble," where the clinicians with whom they interact are part of the MASH community. Last year's ICER Public Comments session exposed them to an FDA Advisory Board of hepatologists...and it was a very different experience. Last year's conversation notes reveal what happened and the advocates' reactions: In March 2023, Jeff McIntyre (GLI) introduc...

Send us Fan Mail In this closing conversation, Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives Chair Jeff Lazarus and Surfers Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green discuss the upcoming United Nations General Assembly side event and consider ways listeners can support the "Healthy LIvers, Healthy Lives" coalition. Jeff discussed this impact on global care when the World Health Organization develops and releases a global health sector strategy. One key goal in public health is to lobby for a MASLD ...

Send us Fan Mail Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives Chair Jeff Lazarus joins Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss the value of the updated EASL/EASD/EASO MASLD clinical practice guidelines and consider the role of Big Data in early MASLD screening. Roger asks Jeff whether he considers the updated MASLD CPG a step forward. Jeff praises the guidelines as "amazing" and suggests that one reason is that EASD and EASO are partners in drafting and promoting them. Roger's ...

Send us Fan Mail Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives Chair Jeff Lazarus joins Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss some of the specific structural challenges that confront global MASLD public policy, along with some promising local activities. Louise observes that, in her experience, primary care practitioners appreciate the support that specialist nurses can bring in educating providers about the disease and patients about how to better support themselves. Jeff responds ...

Send us Fan Mail Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives Chair Jeff Lazarus joins Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss why political will is so important in overcoming inertia and obstruction in global MASLD public health policy. Louise notes that she left NHS because of obstruction against earlier stage efforts to promote liver health and asks how to achieve these goals. To Jeff, it all depends on political will. He provides an example from viral hepatitis to prove his point....

Send us Fan Mail Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives Chair Jeff Lazarus joins Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss how the coalition came into existence and to describe two initiatves aimed at increasing early screening. Jeff starts the conversation by describing the "bit of a bubble" in which the MASLD community lives: great news and lots of excitement within, but very limited exposure to related metabolic specialties (endocrinology, primary care, cardiology) and limited ...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 22 Jeff Lazarus joins Jörn Schattenberg, Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss Healthy Livers, Healthy Lives, a coalition of four major professional organizations (AASLD, ALEH, APASL and EASL) and other partners. This coalition works with other specialties to create global public health awareness and drive "top-down" solutions that are pivotal to stemming the MASLD Tsunami. 00:06:48 - The need for a MASLD public healt...

Send us Fan Mail This week's vault conversation looks back 17 months when Ken Cusi joined co-hosts Louise Campbell, Jörn Schatenberg and Roger Green to discuss the revised AASLD Practice Guidance that had been issued the previous week. At the time, here was SurfingMASH's summary of the conversation: Late last week, AASLD published new practice guidance on the clinical assessment and management of NAFLD. The Surfers convene with Ken Cusi, who contributed to the previous iteration published i...

Send us Fan Mail In this closing conversation, updated MASLD CPG co-authors Frank Tacke and Elisabetta Bugianesi and podcast co-hosts Louise Campbell and Roger Green consider what the guidelines might foretell in changes in provider education, structure of patient visits and treatment in less affluent or medically advanced countries. The last set of questions begins with Roger asking what kinds of changes the authors would like to see in the healthcare system. Frank likes Louise's ide...

Send us Fan Mail For most of this conversation, updated MASLD CPG co-authors Frank Tacke and Elisabetta Bugianesi discuss key issues related to pharmacology and prescribing choices. At the end, the focus shifts to the guidelines' overall benefits and some new kinds of education they call for. The conversation starts with co-host Roger Green asking about key issues from the pharmacology section. Frank states that one benefit of the CPG is the clarity around the point that optimal treatm...

Send us Fan Mail In this conversation, updated MASLD CPG co-authors Frank Tacke and Elisabetta Bugianesi discuss some of the guidelines' key goals and issues surrounding the screening, diagnosis and management of MASLD patients. As the conversation starts, co-host Roger Green says that he, too, was impressed that all these adjustments were made within a month at the end of the process. Frank praises the "very engaged Delphi panel" that reacted and voted quickly, and fairly consistently...

Send us Fan Mail In this conversation, updated MASLD CPG co-authors Frank Tacke and Elisabetta Bugianesi explain how the guidelines process benefitted from the close collaboration between EASL, EASD, and EASO. The conversation starts with Elisabetta conveying the "big advantage" that came from this collaboration. The presence of the three organizations conveyed the need to create a common way to manage patients with MASLD, many of whom live with diabetes and obesity. The guideline als...

Send us Fan Mail Two of the co-authors of the upgraded MASLD Clinical Practice Guidelines, Elisabetta Bugianesi and Frank Tacke join Louise Campbell and Roger Green to discuss the guidelines. The theme for the conversation is "introductions". First, the audience is introduced to co-authors Elisabetta Bugianesi and Frank Tacke, neither of whom has Surfed the Tsunami before. Both Elisabetta and Frank have unusual answers to the "one thing our audience would not expect about you if ...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 21 One important session at the EASL Congress 2024 involved the presentation of the new MASLD Clinical Practice Guidelines. CPG co-authors Elisabetta Bugianesi and Frank Tacke join Louise Campbell and Roger Green to share their perspectives on the guidelines' development some key recommendations. 00:09:36 - Revising the guidelines Roger asks the co-authors to describe the process that led to the 2021 decision to revis...

Send us Fan Mail In this conversation from July 2023, Stephen Harrison, Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green discuss the implications of presentations on the FGF-21 agent efruxifermin and the dual GLP/glucagon agonists pemvidutide and efinopegdutide. Here is the description Roger wrote for the original conversation: In this session, conversation shifts from resmetirom to Mazen Noureddin's "NASH Monopoly" game and focuses on the value of FGF-21s and glucagon agents. Stephen posits two comm...

Send us Fan Mail Mazen Noureddin and Naim Alkhouri join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss some of the other major drug development stories from the EASL Congress 2024, with special focus on denifenstat, ION-224 and TAK-227, and to review the SPECIAL study on bariatric surgery and cirrhosis. The panelists concur that all three of these agents have potential value in therapy. Naim expresses some concern about how broad denifestat use will be based on its side effect profile. L...

Send us Fan Mail Mazen Noureddin and Naim Alkhouri join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to focus on the role FGF-21s will play in long-term advanced fibrosis treatment: induction or long-term therapy...or might we even think of the class as being able to produce a "MASH cure?" Responding to Naim's comment closing the previous discussion, Mazen questions why we regard FGF-21 agents as induction therapies given that it appears to be as well tolerated as the oral agents and maintains su...

Send us Fan Mail Naim Alkhouri and Mazen Noureddin join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss issues regarding incretin agonists and results from the efruxiermin late-breaker at the EASL Congress 2024. Naim shares his general excitement about glucagon agents in general. He mentions that the efinopegdutide study included a semaglutide cell, which showed further reduction in liver fat vs. the GLP-1 agent. Jörn comments on the high level of tolerability in the survodutide trials. Maze...

Send us Fan Mail Mazen Noureddin and Naim Alkhouri join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss the tirzepatide late-breaker at the EASL Congress 2024 and other "Twin-cretins," all of which are GLP-glucagon combinations. "Twin-cretins" is the name Jörn has coined for agents with a GLP-1 agonist plus another incretin effect. Tirzepatide is a GLP/GIP agent, while survodutide and the agents discussed last year, pemvidutide and efinopegdutide, are GLP/gluagons. Naim reviews the...

Send us Fan Mail Naim Alkhouri and Mazen Noureddin join Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss some of the new research on resmetirom at the EASL Congress 2024. Mazen begins this discussion by covering a paper he presented on Stephen's behalf, looking at dose-response with resmetirom. The analysis indicated that PDFF and histology improvements at the 100mg dose were greater than at the 80mg dose. Mazen speculates that the higher dose might provide a greater anti-fibrotic response as we...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 Surf's Up, Season 5 Episode 20 Naim Alkhouri and Mazen Noureddin join co-hosts Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green to discuss major drug development stories from the EASL Congress 2024. They pay tribute to Stephen Harrison and proceed to groundbreakers. 00:08:16 - Presentations on Resmetirom Mazen shares a paper he presented looking at resmetirom dose-response. The 100mg dose performed better than the 80mg dose. Jörn notes that the most important element of the study ...

Send us Fan Mail 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 19 During EASL Congress 2024, US-based Roger Green, conducted interviews with Mike Betel, Louise Campbell (twice) and Sven Francque from Milano. These interviews focused on the major MASLD themes and presentations at the event. 00:04:14 - Conversation with Mike Betel begins On Wednesday, the first afternoon of the meeting, Mike Betel joined Roger from the convention center. The first part of the conversation centered ...

Send us Fan Mail In this final conversation, Sober Livers leaders Jenn Jones and Beth Lehman share what they hope listeners will take from this discussion of HOPE (Healing Others with Peers and Education) and how they can help this unique support program grow. The conversation starts with Roger asking what Sober Livers and/or transplant centers can do to help patients learn how to find a living donor. Beth says one key is to make "living liver" synonymous with transplantation, "as with...

Send us Fan Mail Sober Livers leaders Jenn Jones and Beth Lehman join Roger Green to discuss HOPE, their new support community for people who have harmed themselves through AUD (Alcohol Use Disorder). This conversation focuses on plans and hopes for the future. Roger starts this conversation by sharing a story from his own experience about the pressure caregivers struggle with and asks how HOPE (Healing Others with Peers and Education) will address caregivers and their needs. Beth acknowled...

Send us Fan Mail In this conversation, Society of Sober LIvers leaders Jenn Jones and Beth Lehman describe the HOPE (Healing Others with Peers and Education) program. They go on to discuss why version 1.0 does not include specific support for caregivers. Jenn describes the program's core elements, starting with a monthly video call that is a support meeting one month and an educational program the next. The program will include a Facebook group where individuals can continue thei...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation focuses on the target population of patients with AUD (Alcohol Use Disorder) with decompensated cirrhosis and asks why this group needs a support community like HOPE (Healing Others with Peers and Education). Roger asks what makes people who have harmed their bodies through AUD a unique community as compared to other communities providing support for people trying to change their behaviors. Beth and Jenn explain that the lifelong medical challenges associat...

Send us Fan Mail This conversation re-introduces us to Sober Livers Founder/Visionary Jenn Jones and introduces us to Beth Lehman, Principal Strategic Advisor to Sober Livers and HOPE, a multi-element patient support program for people who have harmed their livers though AUD (Alcohol Use Disorder). As this conversation starts, we meet Beth Lehman, Principal Strategic Advisor for Sober LIvers, who discusses her disease background and personal history and adds one thing we might not know about...

Send us Fan Mail Roger Green is joined by Sober Livers Founder/Visionary Jenn Jones and Principal Strategic Advisor Beth Lehman to discuss HOPE, a support program launching June 11 for people who have harmed their bodies through ALD and its consequences. 00:00:00 - Surf's Up: Season 5 Episode 18 Standard lead-in, including quotes from panelists 00:02:07 - Introduction Roger describes the episode structure. 00:03:44 - Meet Beth Lehman Beth Lehman, Principal Strategic Advisor for Sober L...