SUMMARY
Mayo Clinic researcher W Ray Kim, M.D., develops quantitative approaches to improve clinical and policy decisions in liver disease and transplantation. His studies integrate predictive modeling, large-scale clinical data, outcomes research and policy analysis to help healthcare professionals make the correct diagnosis and deliver the right care at the right time. His work has produced practical tools that translate these insights into improvements in clinical decision-making and patient outcomes.
Dr. Kim's research focuses on chronic liver disease and its treatment, spanning metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease, advanced liver disease and liver transplantation. He has led research to develop and refine the Model for End-Stage Liver Disease (MELD) score, which prioritizes liver transplant candidates to achieve the best outcomes. MELD score has become the standard in the U.S. and many other parts of the world.
Another area of Dr. Kim's research is the early detection and prevention of steatotic liver disease, the most common chronic liver disease. Dr. Kim helped develop the Steatosis-Associated Fibrosis Estimator (SAFE) score, a tool that identifies patients at risk of developing irreversible liver damage before advanced disease occurs. Early identification can help clinicians initiate effective therapies to slow or prevent progression to cirrhosis and, sometimes, reduce the need for liver transplantation.
In 2025, Dr. Kim established the Center for Policy and Outcomes Research in Transplantation (CPORT) at Mayo Clinic. The center is conducting studies to improve access to transplantation, donor organ use, allocation policies, health drivers and patient outcomes across local health systems and at the national level. These studies include not only liver transplantation but also kidney, heart and lung transplantation.
Focus areas
Liver transplant risk prediction
Dr. Kim explores how mortality risk can be measured accurately in advanced liver disease and incorporated into liver allocation decisions. His research on MELD score and its refinements examines how well these tools predict risk and how they can be updated as patient populations, treatments and allocation policies change.
Early fibrosis risk stratification
Dr. Kim investigates ways to identify people with metabolic liver disease who may be at risk of significant liver scarring or fibrosis. He developed the SAFE score and now evaluates how risk scores and noninvasive tests can help primary care teams determine which patients need additional testing or referral to a liver specialist.
Dr. Kim's research draws on his expertise in implementing clinical prediction models, with a particular focus on evaluating how quantitative risk models perform after they are integrated into real-world clinical practice and health policy settings. His work emphasizes interpretability, implementation and continued reassessment with the aim of keeping prediction tools useful as populations, treatments, resource constraints and healthcare priorities evolve.
Transplant policy and outcomes
As the founding director of CPORT, Dr. Kim has spearheaded a number of studies examining how organ allocation policies, donor organ use and transplant program practices affect access to transplantation and patient outcomes. Ongoing studies at CPORT include evaluations of the effects of policy changes on patients, donors and transplant programs. Researchers use these findings to identify ways to improve the transplant system.
An important aspect of CPORT's work addresses transplant access, identifying and investigating ways to remove barriers that prevent patients from progressing from diagnosis and referral to transplant evaluation, waitlisting and transplantation. CPORT engages in large-scale data and policy analysis, identifying variations in health outcomes and formulating policy approaches to broaden access while maintaining high standards of patient care.
Significance to patient care
Dr. Kim's research has helped improve how patients are prioritized for liver transplantation. His work on MELD contributed to a data-based system that assesses how urgently a person needs a liver transplant. This approach helps ensure that patients who are most seriously ill receive higher priority on the transplant waiting list.
Dr. Kim also studies ways to identify liver disease earlier, before serious complications develop. He helped develop the SAFE score, a tool designed to identify people at risk of liver scarring, also called fibrosis. Earlier detection may allow patients to receive treatment sooner and help prevent progression to cirrhosis and the need for liver transplantation.
More recently, Dr. Kim founded CPORT. The center studies ways to improve organ donation and transplantation, expand access to transplant care, and improve outcomes for patients and donors.
Together, Dr. Kim's research aims to help patients receive the right care at the right time while improving how donated organs and other healthcare resources are used.
Professional highlights
- Dr. Andres Blei Memorial Lecture, Northwestern University, 2025.
- American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases:
- Governing board member, 2020-2025.
- President, 2024.
- Founding trustee of the AASLD Foundation, 2014-2017.
- Distinguished Mentor Award, Asociación Latinoamericana para el Estudio del Hígado, 2024.
- Robert Carithers Visiting Professor, University of Washington, 2024.
- Professor and chief, Gastroenterology and Hepatology, Stanford University School of Medicine, 2013-2024.
- Dr. Richard Fedorak Memorial Lecture, University of Alberta, 2023.
- Edward Heil Lectureship, Mayo Clinic, 2022.
- Dr. S. H. Ho Memorial Lecture, International Digestive Disease Forum, 2020.
- Chang Yul Oh Achievement Award, Korean American Medical Association, 2019.
- Carroll M. Leevy, MD Recognition Award, Rutgers University, 2017.