Barbara Murphy, MD, a leading nephrologist and chair of the department of medicine at the Mount Sinai Health System, died June 30 at the age of 56, reports The New York Times.
Dr. Murphy was from Ireland and went to medical school at the Royal College of Surgeons in Dublin where her interest in kidney transplantation blossomed. She joined Mount Sinai in 1997 as director of transplant nephrology and went on to serve as chief of nephrology. She stepped into her chair role in 2012, becoming the first woman to run a department of medicine at an academic medical center in New York City.
Dr. Murphy also had a strong passion for research into kidney transplant immunology and most recently specialized in work predicting and diagnosing outcomes of kidney transplants.
"In baseball, they talk about five-tool players," Dennis S. Charney, MD, dean of the Icahn School of Medicine, told the Times. "I don't know how many tools she had, but she was a very strong administrator, a great researcher and a great mentor to many people."
Dr. Murphy died at New York-City-based Mount Sinai Hospital from glioblastoma, an aggressive form of brain cancer, her husband told the Times.