{"id":245775,"date":"2025-10-23T09:55:16","date_gmt":"2025-10-23T09:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/245775\/"},"modified":"2025-10-23T09:55:16","modified_gmt":"2025-10-23T09:55:16","slug":"hes-a-legendary-transplant-surgeon-at-88-his-work-isnt-done","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/245775\/","title":{"rendered":"He\u2019s a Legendary Transplant Surgeon. At 88, His Work Isn\u2019t Done"},"content":{"rendered":"

This article is part of\u00a0\u201cOn Borrowed Time\u201d<\/a>\u00a0a series by Anissa Durham that examines the people, policies, and systems that hurt or help Black patients in need of an organ transplant.\u00a0Read part\u00a0one<\/a>,\u00a0two<\/a>, and\u00a0three<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s the 1960s. Inside a patient\u2019s hospital room, cardiac monitors beep softly in the dark. The faint rise and fall of a chest. The hum of machines. There are no cell phones or call buttons. The floor is hard, cold to the touch \u2014\u00a0not the kind of place you\u2019d want to sleep.<\/p>\n

On many nights, it\u2019s where Dr. Clive O. Callender, then a young chief resident at Freedmen\u2019s Hospital in Washington, D.C., lays his head for a nap. Every few hours, he wakes to check on a patient who has just received a new kidney or liver.<\/p>\n

It was an unconventional approach, but Dr. Callender, now 88, says it was necessary to keep them alive. He is, after all, one of the nation\u2019s first Black transplant surgeons, a position that required him to be better than good. In the 1960s, he was carrying the weight of proving Black folks could be transplant surgeons on his slender shoulders. So Dr. Callender was taking no chances.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

When he completed his surgical training in 1973 at the University of Minnesota, Dr. Callender says he became the third Black transplant surgeon in the world. Over the next six decades, he dedicated his entire career to saving lives and to ensuring Black people had equal access to organ transplants.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Without Dr. Callender, it\u2019s questionable whether transplantation for Black folks would have gotten to where it is today. He is, without a doubt, a hidden figure in this space. Throughout his career, he performed more than 600 transplant surgeries, trained hundreds of doctors, and founded The National Minority Organ Tissue Transplant Education Program<\/a>, or MOTTEP. He\u2019s received more than 200 honors and awards from medical associations for his work. And nowadays, several awards are named after him.<\/p>\n

But behind the white coat is a humble, God-fearing man who still grapples with an internal dilemma: Did his patients thrive at the expense of his family?<\/p>\n

\u201cI wish I could have spent more time at home with my wife and my children, that\u2019s my only regret,\u201d he says. \u201cBut you know, I truly believe that God came first, then my patients, and then my family.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Man Behind the White Coat<\/p>\n

I met Dr. Callender for the first time on a rainy June day in Washington, D.C., at the place he\u2019s spent most of his career, Howard University Hospital, which used to be Freedman\u2019s Hospital. He\u2019s a quiet but confident man with a razor-sharp memory. He can name every person he\u2019s ever worked with: doctors he\u2019s trained, the head of the National Institutes of Health in the \u201880s, and patients he\u2019s transplanted.<\/p>\n

Lately, his daughter, Dr. Ealena Callender, drives him to and from the hospital to the brick two-story Maryland home where they\u2019ve lived since the late 1970s. After our initial meet and greet at the hospital, we headed off to the suburbs. It\u2019s a 45-minute, one-way commute. Her Harlem-born and raised father doesn\u2019t drive \u2014 he never learned. Ealena tells me that occasionally you\u2019ll see foxes, deer, and squirrels roaming the area.<\/p>\n

Inside the house, I left my shoes at the door, and Ealena showed me around downstairs. A light pink plush carpet covers the floors. White orchids and blush-colored curtains decorate the room. Family photos and a copy of the \u201cNew National Baptist Hymnal\u201d sit atop an upright piano. In the living room, Callender\u2019s favorite armchair sits in a corner. It\u2019s where he prays at the start and end of each day.<\/p>\n

\"\"Pictures of Dr. Callender\u2019s son (left) and daughter, Ealena (right), sit atop a piano in Silver Spring, Maryland on June 16, 2025 Credit: William Vargas<\/p>\n

\"\"Dr. Callender and his daughter, Ealena, look through old photos in the living room. Photographed in Silver Spring, Maryland on June 16, 2025. Credit: William Vargas<\/p>\n

A large poster of Dr. Callender\u2019s late wife, Fern Irene Callender, catches my eye in the hallway. She died April 2 \u2014 just a few weeks before what would have been their 57th wedding anniversary. Since her mother\u2019s passing, Ealena tells me she\u2019s taken more time off work. But Dr. Callender hasn\u2019t slowed down.<\/p>\n

On a Mission to Increase Black Organ Donors<\/p>\n

In 1963, when Dr. Callender graduated first in his class from Meharry Medical College, an HBCU in Nashville, organ transplantation had only been around for about a decade. He headed home to Harlem for a surgical residency \u2014\u00a0getting into the transplant space wasn\u2019t on his mind. But Harlem Hospital, a teaching hospital affiliated with Columbia University, \u201ctreated me like a stepchild,\u201d he says. So in 1969, he completed his residency at Freedman\u2019s Hospital.<\/p>\n

Not long after, Dr. Callender started sounding the alarm about disparities in organ allocation. It took more than a decade for people to listen. In southeastern states in the 1980s and \u201890s, Black patients had the highest rate of end-stage renal disease, a condition that eventually requires a kidney transplant. Yet they were less likely to qualify for transplantation, and fewer than 10% of organ donors were Black.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Part of the problem stemmed from how donor-recipient matches were made. Antigen profiles are different among racial groups, but for nearly 50 years, physicians identified and prioritized genetic HLA-B markers found primarily in white patients. The practice led to higher transplantation rates for white patients than Black ones.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In 2003, after persistent advocacy from Dr. Callender, the U.S. kidney allocation system<\/a> was changed to eliminate priority for HLA-B similarity. The result: more transplants<\/a> for minority patients and no drop in success rates.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really didn\u2019t occur to me that I was doing anything special,\u201d he says. \u201cEven when you read papers now about the changes that have occurred as a consequence of my interventions, they don\u2019t mention my name. It\u2019s because of my speaking out, that\u2019s what made the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n

While allocation issues were starting to improve, another question bothered Dr. Callender: why were Black Americans less likely to register as organ donors?<\/p>\n

In 1978, a pilot study spearheaded by Dr. Callender and funded by Howard University Hospital asked 40 Black men and women in Washington, D.C., about their hesitancy to donate their organs. Dr. Callender and his team found five main reasons:<\/a> lack of education about how many Black people need organs, religious beliefs and misperceptions, distrust of the medical system, fear of a premature declaration of death if a Black person is a registered donor, and a preference for Black donor organs to go to Black recipients.<\/p>\n

At the start of the study\u2019s interviews, only two participants were registered organ donors. But after a two-hour session, all 40 became donors. Published in 1982, the study set the stage for how to educate the Black community and other minority populations about organ donation.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Later that year, the National Kidney Foundation and Howard University Hospital initiated the District of Columbia Organ Donor Project. By 1989, monthly donor registrations jumped from 25 to 750. By 1990, the percentage of Black people surveyed through this project who later registered as organ donors rose from 7% to 24%.<\/p>\n

In 1991, Dr. Callender conceptualized and founded MOTTEP<\/a> to expand the work of educating Black, Brown, and other non-white people nationwide about organ donation. He initially asked for a $5 million grant from the National Institutes of Health Office of Minority Health but was offered just $400,000 to set up sites in Brooklyn, D.C, and Maryland. The following year, he got another $800,000. Four years later, in 1995, Dr. Callender and his team received a $6 million grant to expand to 15 cities.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unbelievable. It\u2019s miraculous,\u201d he says. \u201cAll we did was educate and empower the community. We let them do the job.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m thrilled and excited to say I\u2019ve been part of MOTTEP,\u201d he adds. \u201cThis is the kind of thing that has made my life worth living.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018She Was My Biggest Fan\u2019<\/p>\n

Fern Irene Marshall was born July 15, 1943, at Freedmen\u2019s Hospital,\u00a0the same hospital where she later worked as an operating room nurse. She met Dr. Callender during the fourth year of his residency when she began working with him.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the early years of their marriage, balancing career and family was difficult. Ealena says her mom often told them Callender was breaking barriers and saving lives.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe was my biggest fan. Whatever deficiencies that I had as a father, she made up for them as a wife and mother,\u201d he says. \u201cEverything I\u2019ve done successfully is a consequence of her support. There\u2019s nothing I\u2019ve done in which she did not support me. Most of the credit is related to my God and my wife, and my family.\u201d<\/p>\n

His legacy is as much hers as it is his. When asked if he thinks he would\u2019ve made it this far in his career without his wife, his response is immediate.<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if I\u2019d be alive without my wife,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The President Is Home<\/p>\n

Within hours of his and his twin brother\u2019s arrival in the world, their mother died from childbirth complications. His older sister, Gloria, named them. With his father often away working, Dr. Callender lived in various foster homes. He credits his aunt, who helped raise him, for introducing him to church.<\/p>\n

At age 7, he dedicated his life to Christ and decided to become a medical missionary. His goal was to go to Africa and address the \u201csouls of mankind.\u201d But things took a turn for the worse in the 1940s when he contracted pulmonary tuberculosis at age 15. At the time, there was no cure for tuberculosis. After six months in the hospital, doctors removed half of his right lung. After another year in the hospital, he was finally healthy enough to return to school.<\/p>\n

That near-death experience strengthened his faith \u2014 and his resolve to honor and glorify God by saving lives. It also informed the type of doctor he was determined to become \u2014 one rooted in community.<\/p>\n

Throughout her childhood, Ealena remembers her dad\u2019s bedtime stories \u2014 mini sagas about growing up with his twin brother in Harlem, his father working as a chef on segregated trains, and the time he lived with his stepmother. Every story added a little more detail and a little more color to the man she calls \u201cdaddy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

When he came home after long stretches at the hospital, it felt like the president walking through the front door. Immediately, she and her two siblings would grab onto him and persuade him to take them for a walk. \u201cWe would just say, \u2018Walk, walk, daddy walk,\u2019\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Even when he was absent, his love as a father was constant.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt hurts my feelings when he says he was a lousy father and a lousy husband,\u201d Ealena says. \u201cEven if he wasn\u2019t physically here, he appreciated us and my mother to the utmost. He adored her and respected her. I don\u2019t think he took her for granted. He appreciated the person she allowed him to be.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Dr. Callender\u2019s commitment to his craft deterred Ealena and her siblings from pursuing medicine \u2014 at least, initially. Ealena studied print journalism at Howard and joined the student newspaper, The Hilltop. After working as a reporter for a few years, including a stint at the Los Angeles Times, she felt a strong pull towards medicine,\u00a0but she hesitated to switch careers. In her eyes, to be a doctor meant to practice with the same intensity as her dad \u2014 at the hospital for weeks on end.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt some point, my mom said, \u2018You don\u2019t have to be your father,\u201d\u2019 Ealena says. \u201cIt sounds simple. But it was mindblowing. I didn\u2019t think I could be a doctor if I wasn\u2019t just like him.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ealena graduated from medical school in 2002. Now a practicing OB-GYN, she says her specialty helps her understand why her father was so devoted to his patients. They often sent pies, cakes, and macaroni and cheese home with him as thanks for saving their lives.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cMy father\u2019s legacy is infinite,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

\"\"Dr. Ealena Callender photographed in her family home in Silver Spring, Maryland on June 16. 2025. Credit: William Vargas for Word In Black<\/p>\n

The Road to Transplant Surgery\u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a miracle that Dr. Callender became a surgeon. After graduating from high school, he enrolled at Hunter College, one of the campuses in the City University of New York system. Once there, he failed chemistry, English, and history classes, and at one point, his GPA was only 1.8. Advisors took one look at his undergraduate grades and told him he wasn\u2019t cut out for medicine. By his senior year, he raised his GPA to a 2.5, but needed a 3.5 to get into medical school. At the time, only two medical schools admitted Black students: Meharry and Howard.\u00a0<\/p>\n

His acceptance at Meharry \u201cwas to my classmates\u2019 utter shock and mine as well,\u201d Dr. Callender says. \u201cMy twin brother, sister, and father thought I was insane for wanting to become a doctor.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then the next hurdle came. Who would pay for it?\u00a0<\/p>\n

As Dr. Callender tells the story, his eyes water and his voice catches. To his surprise, Ebenezer Gospel Tabernacle in Harlem held a special service to raise the funds for his tuition. It\u2019s a day he\u2019s never forgotten.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Once he became board certified, he met a Nigerian medical student who told him that missionaries were needed in Port Harcourt, Nigeria. So, in 1970, Fern and Dr. Callender signed up to stay for five years.\u00a0But after nine months, he returned to Washington, 50 pounds lighter due to illness. He later went back to Africa, alone. During those three months, he contracted malaria and lost another 25 pounds.<\/p>\n

It became clear that being a medical missionary was not in the cards for him, so he decided to return to the U.S. and dedicate himself fully to transplant surgery. A few years later, in 1974, Dr. Callender founded the Howard University Hospital Transplant Center.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been through a lot of impossible situations and I\u2019ve learned that obstacles are only stepping stones to success,\u201d he says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"\"Dr. Callender and his daughter, Dr. Ealena Callender, look through old calendars and photos in the Silver Spring, Maryland family home on June 16, 2025. Credit: William Vargas for Word In Black<\/p>\n

Passing the Baton<\/p>\n

Inside the fourth-floor hallways of Howard University Hospital, pictures of Callender line the walls. A corner conference room bears his name \u2014 it\u2019s decorated with newspaper clippings, research papers, and photos of him performing transplant surgeries.\u00a0<\/p>\n

For decades, he\u2019s mentored and trained hundreds of students, many of whom have gone on to become transplant surgeons themselves. Edward Cornwell III, now chair of the Department of Surgery, once trained under Callender. They\u2019ve worked alongside each other for more than 40 years.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a man with a famous gaggling laugh,\u201d Cornwell says.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Beau Kelly grew up bouncing between poor Black neighborhoods in Detroit and the Carolinas. He remembers seeing a lot of racism, disparities in health care, poverty, and drug addiction. This environment pushed him to study medicine, fueled by the desire to fix some of these broken systems.<\/p>\n

Kelly, now a surgical director and liver transplant surgeon at Sierra Donor Services, says Dr. Callender changed his life while he was a med student at Howard through a presentation about organ transplantation. Callender became his mentor, and they text almost every day.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve never had a mentor tell me that they love me,\u201d Kelly says. \u201cHe is the type of person who spends the majority of his time looking up. He never stops trying to achieve better.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2010, Dr. Callender put his surgical instruments away. But he still teaches a class at Howard on transplantation ethics and professionalism. When asked if he\u2019s considered retirement, the answer is straightforward \u2014 no.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI haven\u2019t worked a day in my life,\u201d he says. \u201cIt\u2019s been fun. I have no need to retire.\u201d<\/p>\n

With tears in his eyes, he offered thanks to the patients he\u2019s taken care of and his family who\u2019ve stood by his side. Without them, there would be no Dr. Callender.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cI gave. I gave all I could give.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\"Dr. Clive O. Callender photographed in his family home in Silver Spring, Maryland on June 16, 2025. Credit: William Vargas for Word In Black<\/p>\n

Get Word In Black directly in your inbox.\u00a0Subscribe today<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Anissa Durham reported this story as one of the 2025 U.S. Health System Reporting fellows supported by the Association of Health Care Journalists and the Commonwealth Fund.\u00a0The Commonwealth Fund also supports Word In Black\u2019s health reporting.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This article is part of\u00a0\u201cOn Borrowed Time\u201d\u00a0a series by Anissa Durham that examines the people, policies, and systems…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":245776,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[59],"tags":[6943,97,252,253,5104],"class_list":["post-245775","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-health-care","tag-black-history","tag-health","tag-health-care","tag-healthcare","tag-organ-transplant"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245775","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=245775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/245775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/245776"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=245775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=245775"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=245775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}