J. Kelly Wright Jr., MD, professor of Surgery, was honored at a retirement reception on Sept. 13 for 34 years of service as a founding member of the liver transplant team at Vanderbilt.
Wright, a native of Cookeville, Tennessee, was recruited to VUMC in 1990 by John Sawyers, MD, then chair of the Section of Surgical Sciences, along with C. Wright Pinson, MBA, MD, Deputy Chief Executive Officer and Chief Health System Officer.
Wright and Pinson performed Vanderbilt’s first liver transplant in 1991. This year, VUMC celebrated its 3,000th liver transplant.
“During the early years we worked alongside many others to establish what is now one of the most successful liver transplant programs in the country, and in 2023 it was ranked as the 15th largest liver transplant program by volume,” Pinson said.
Wright’s son, Jesse Wright, MD, recounted growing up during the early years of the program when the house phone would ring at 2 a.m., his father working at all hours to make liver transplants happen whenever the call came in. Jesse Wright completed his surgical residency at VUMC under the mentorship of his father. Now a colorectal surgeon, Jesse said his father “remains [his] No. 1 consultant for difficult cases and has the ability to make complex decisions seem simple.”
Wright began his surgical career in high school, mopping the floors of nearby Baptist Hospital’s operating rooms where his father, John Kelly Wright Sr., MD, worked as a surgeon. It was during this job he decided he wasn’t going to just mop the floors; he was going to be the surgeon doing the cases.
Wright graduated magna cum laude from Vanderbilt University in 1977 with a degree in physics and later earned his medical degree in 1981 from Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He completed his internship, residency and fellowships at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
Beginning in 2002, Wright became the surgical director of the liver transplant program; in 2008 he also became chief of the Division of Hepatobiliary Surgery and Liver Transplantation. He continued these roles until 2016.
“While there was a lot of hard work involved in these last 34 years, I have been the recipient of many great opportunities and gifts in life,” Wright said. “Thanks to each of you for teaming up with me for all these years. I couldn’t be prouder.”
