Distinguished service award for prominent UCalgary liver specialist

Posted March 9, 2010
By Jordanna Heller

Dr. Eldon ShafferLiver disease is much more than cirrhosis and hepatitis. Thanks to the work of people like UCalgary hepatologist Dr. Eldon Shaffer, awareness and treatment for a variety of liver diseases is growing and helping the more than three million Canadians who live with the diseases.

Dr. Shaffer founded and became the first president of the Canadian Association for the Study of the Liver (CASL) 25 years ago. The association is an academic, research and education group dedicated to hepatology. Its creation provides many opportunities in the field.

“It put Canada on the map allowing heptologists to meet and brainstorm, giving the discipline the ability to organize and work with liver specialists around the world,” explains Shaffer.

The CASL has recognized Shaffer’s dedication and expertise with a Distinguished Service and Meritorious Achievement award. “To be recognized by one’s peers and colleagues when you’ve spent a career trying to make a difference is thrilling. Then someone tells you that you have made a difference, it’s such an honour,” says Dr. Shaffer of the ceremony that took place earlier this month in Toronto.

The last quarter century has been a time of discovery.  With an unfortunate growth in the number of people suffering from liver diseases, unique conditions such as hepatitis C, liver cancers and obesity leading to fatty liver disease have become much more prevalent. New therapies to combat hepatitis are emerging and liver transplantation is a success story for many, limited primarily by available donor livers.

The Faculty of Medicine at the University of Calgary has also benefitted greatly from Dr. Shaffer’s expertise. He initiated a Royal College-accredited Division of Gastroenterology and a gastroenterology residency training program, which has lead to the recruitment and training of more than 30 gastroenterologists and hepatologists to Alberta and abroad. He’s currently a Professor in the Department of Medicine.