Melissa Palmer is a hepatologist with more than 30 years experience as a key opinion leader (KOL) in the field of liver disease. She is the CMO of Gannex Pharma.

Gannex is a wholly owned company of Ascletis Pharma and fully dedicated to the R&D and commercialization of new drugs in the field of NASH. Melissa Palmer, MD, an internationally renowned Hepatologist joined the Company as Chief Medical Officer, effective December 1, 2020.

Prior to joining Gannex, Melissa Palmer was Head of Liver Disease Clinical Development at Takeda Pharmaceuticals. She has also held senior leadership positions at Shire Pharmaceuticals and Kadmon Corporation, where she was in charge of the global development of NASH and other liver disease programs. Prior to joining industry, she was clinical professor at NYU Langone Medical Center and director of Hepatology at NYU Plainview, NY. Since 1991, Dr. Palmer served as a Hepatology consultant to more than 40 biotech and pharmaceutical companies and was a primary investigator on numerous clinical trials in liver disease.

Dr. Palmer has authored over 100 publications, abstracts, articles, and book chapters, in addition to a best-selling book on liver disease “Dr. Melissa Palmer’s Guide to Hepatitis and Liver Disease”. She trained in Hepatology at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, where she also received her M.D. degree. She received her Bachelor of Science degree from Columbia University in New York City.

“As we continue to make breakthroughs in the clinical development of NASH, I am delighted to have Dr. Palmer join us at this pivotal time,” said Dr. Jinzi J. Wu, Founder, Chairman and CEO of Ascletis. “I am confident that Dr. Palmer’s exceptional skills and expertise will be a great asset as the Company advances its clinical development programs on a global basis.”

“I am excited about joining Gannex which has three clinical stage assets in NASH, ” said Dr. Melissa Palmer, “with impressive phase 2 data from the ASC40 trial in the US and recent US IND approval of ASC42, I am looking forward to working with the Company’s talented team and accelerating clinical development of these drug candidates for NASH patients globally.”

Prior to December, 2020, Melissa Palmer, MD was a hepatology consultant to the biotech/pharmaceutical industry on full life cycle liver disease development– from discovery to launch and commercialization. She has extensive expertise in innovative trial design, liver signal evaluation, DMC, ad board, regulatory interactions, commercialization, CI, Due diligence, trial recruitment.

Dr. Palmer is a internationally renowned in the field of hepatology (KOL), and an experienced biotech/pharma executive. She was in a solo practice devoted to treating and evaluating patients with liver disease until 2009, at which time she became a Full Clinical Professor at NYU Langone and Director of Hepatology at NYU Plainview. Since 1991, Dr. Palmer has served as a consultant to more than 25 biopharma companies as a liver disease expert. Dr. Palmer left NYU Langone to become Senior Vice President of Clinical Research and Head of Hepatology at Kadmon Corporation. After 1 year, Dr. Palmer was promoted to Global Head of Hepatology, and became Senior Vice President of Pharmacovigilance in addition to SVP of Clinical Research.
Melissa Palmer, MD left Kadmon in 2015 to become the Global Clinical Lead on Shire’s NASH program, as well as to consult on other liver-related issues within Shire– such as cholestatic liver disease, pediatric liver disease and liver-related safety issues (DILI), and was rapidly promoted to Global Development Lead – Hepatology. Shire was acquired by Takeda in 2019 and Dr. Palmer was made Head of Liver Disease Development at Takeda.

Melissa Palmer was hepatology consultant prior to joining Gannex Pharma. She was the CEO of Liver Consulting LLC. She consulted on innovative trial designs for NASH and other liver diseases such as PSC, as well as regulatory interactions. Dr. Palmer has co-authored numerous joint FDA guidelines, and has extensive experience with
liver signal evaluation during clinical trials, (DILI), formation of ad boards, DSMC, commercialization and pipeline assessment.

Dr. Palmer graduated from Columbia University with a Bachelor in Science and was trained in Hepatology (as well as medical school) at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York City. She has authored numerous medical and lay-public books, and book chapters, and has contributed to three encyclopedias on various liver-related topics. Melissa Palmer, MD is the author of the best-selling book “Dr. Melissa Palmer’s Guide to Hepatitis & Liver Disease.” Her scientific publications in the field of Hepatology have appeared in such peer-reviewed journals as Hepatology, Gastroenterology, Seminars of Liver Disease, Transplantation, AP&T and she is a contributing editor of several peer-reviewed journals.

Melissa Palmer is a liver disease Key Opinion Leader (KOL) whose specialties include: Hepatology, Nonalcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD), nonalcoholic steatohepatitis (NASH) Liver Disease, Clinical Research, Pharmacovigilance, Clinical trial Innovation. Drug Development, Cholestatic Liver disease, Drug-Induced Liver Injury, DILI , cholestatic liver disease, primary Biliary cholangitis, Primary sclerosing cholangitis (PSC), Phase 1,2,3, Hepatitis, PFIC