New Columbia Center Will Advance Diagnostics Through Innovation and Clinical Translation

Most healthcare decision-making depends on diagnostic tests, which also yield information for disease identification, classification, and evaluation of therapeutic impact. Stella Kang, MD, MS, an abdominal radiologist who will join Columbia on December 1st, sees tremendous opportunity at Columbia to more quickly and effectively translate new diagnostics into clinical care by breaking down barriers between traditionally siloed specialties.

Kang will lead a new multidisciplinary center based in the Department of Radiology, the Center for Advanced Diagnostic Research (CADRe), which will bring together expertise from multiple departments, schools, and institutes at Columbia to pursue diagnostic advancement and technology transfer. The center aims to support projects involving newly developed tests or decision-making tools that have undergone some level of testing, by designing and conducting clinical translational research studies designed to bring the tools to the clinic more rapidly.

One of the center’s primary goals, says Kang, will be to use diagnostics to identify populations that would benefit from a particular test or more personalized testing regimens, as well as a particular treatment.

“Modern computing power and knowledge of the molecular underpinnings of disease define the current era of diagnostic health technology,” says Kang, “and traditionally siloed specialties based on the use of microscopy, radiology, or laboratory values fall short of amassing tremendous opportunities for precision medicine.”

“This is an exciting time and opportunity to bridge some of these efforts and discover even more opportunity for disease prevention, characterization, or treatment.”

Under Dr. Kang’s leadership, CADRe will leverage expertise from partners throughout Columbia University Irving Medical Center and relevant disciplines based at Columbia’s Morningside and Manhattanville campuses, as well as with Columbia’s academic health system partner, NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital.

“Bringing together experts from diverse fields is essential to assess the value of diagnostic testing in healthcare and to speed up the adoption of new technologies in clinical practice,” says Ajay Gupta, MD, MS, professor of radiology and chair of the Department of Radiology at the Columbia University Vagelos College of Physicians and Surgeons. “We are thrilled to welcome Dr. Kang to Columbia to spearhead this new multidisciplinary center. I also look forward to the impact her leadership will have on growing our world-class research programs more generally in the Department of Radiology in the years to come.”

Kang will join Columbia from New York University, where she currently serves as associate chair of population health imaging and outcomes for the Department of Radiology. She is a globally recognized pioneer in outcomes research, health care delivery science, and technology assessment. Her extensive accomplishments include serving as a charter member and acting chair of the Imaging Technology Development study section for the NIH and section editor for Evidence Synthesis and Decision Analysis in the American Journal of Roentgenology. She has developed and directed several national and international research education programs for large professional societies that have informed the career development of hundreds of imagers, including the recently launched Applying Comparative Effectiveness and Quality Improvement Research and Education (ACQUIRE) program, a six-month course designed to promote research in health care delivery and clinical effectiveness.

Kang is the author of more than 100 peer-reviewed publications and serves as principal investigator on multiple studies funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH). She will also serve as professor of radiology and vice chair of clinical research for the Department of Radiology at Columbia.

Kang received her medical degree from Weill Cornell Medical College and completed a diagnostic radiology residency at NYU School of Medicine, where she also served as chief resident. After completing a combined clinical and research fellowship at Massachusetts General Hospital, she obtained a master's degree in clinical investigation concentrated in comparative effectiveness research at NYU. She has also served as a teaching fellow at the Harvard School of Public Health and Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in Advanced Medical Decision-Making.