The C. Mahlon Kline Professorship of Medicine

C. Mahlon KlineThe Professorship was instituted in 1969 through the bequest of C. Mahlon Kline, a distinguished leader in the pharmaceutical industry and loyal supporter of Penn Medicine.

As former Chairman of the Board of the Smith, Kline, and French Laboratories, Mr. Kline was dedicated to promoting cooperative research between academic medicine and the pharmaceutical industry. A long-time champion of Penn Medicine, Mr. Kline invested in organizations “engaged in the furtherance of religious, charitable, scientific, literary, educational purposes or the prevention of cruelty to children or animals.” For his many achievements and contributions to the pharmaceutical industry, he received the Honorary Doctorate of Science from the University of Pennsylvania in 1957.

 

Current Chairholder
Kirk N. Campbell, MD

Dr. Kirk Campbell is the C. Mahlon Kline Professor of Medicine and Chief of the Renal-Electrolyte and Hypertension Division at the University of Pennsylvania Perelman School of Medicine. He joined Penn from the Icahn School of Medicine in New York where he served as the Irene and Dr. Arthur M. Fishberg Professor of Medicine in the Division of Nephrology and Professor of Pharmacological Sciences. Dr. Campbell held several leadership roles at Mount Sinai including serving as the founding Director of the Mount Sinai Center for Kidney Disease Innovation, Nephrology Fellowship Director and Vice Chair of the Department of Medicine.

Dr. Campbell graduated from the University of Connecticut School of Medicine and completed residency training in Internal Medicine at Yale-New Haven Hospital followed by clinical and postdoctoral research fellowships in Nephrology at Mount Sinai. In addition to treating patients with kidney disease, Dr. Campbell leads an NIH-funded research program focused on developing new therapeutic interventions for proteinuric diseases. He actively participates in clinical trials testing novel agents for primary glomerular disease and is an elected member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation.

He is a Past-President of the New York Society of Nephrology and a member of the Board of Directors of the NephCure Foundation. He is the current President of the National Kidney Foundation and Chairs its Scientific Advisory Board.

Previous Chairholders

  • Truman G. Schnabel, Jr., MD 1969–1989
  • Eric G. Neilson, MD 1993–1998
  • Laurence A. Turka, MD 1999–2009
  • Lawrence B. Holzman, MD 2010-2024