Surfing the NASH Tsunami posted on Buzzsprout for the first time on July 23, 2020. Over the past two years, NASH Tsunami has posted 132 episodes and close to 400 posts when we include both episodes and conversations. This week, Jörn Schattenberg and Roger Green review some of the podcast's high points and set the stage for a week of resharing "Greatest Hits" episodes and conversations from the Vault of old postings.
The conversation starts with Jörn and Roger reminiscing about Jörn's first couple of appearances on the podcast, first helping to review the digital ILC 2020 and then coming on a couple of months later to discuss a paper Jörn had recently published looking at why NASH drug trials fail. Jörn and Roger discuss come of the lessons from the paper and how those have translated into changes in drug development and clinical trial strategies.
One interesting side note: Roger asks Jörn about feedback from the original paper. He comments that the authors rarely get feedback, especially those who are not the correspondent author (which Jörn was not for this paper). He commented that he receives more feedback from the discussions on NASH Tsunami, either on the podcast or in subsequent conversations with friends and colleagues who have heard the episode.
Roger goes on to note that while the "Why Trials Fail" paper touched on challenges around biomarkers and conditional endpoints, we were only at the beginning of learning how many flaws existed in the system of semi-quantitative reads. This serves as a bridge to the specific conversations NASH Tsunami will repost from the Vault during this anniversary week. They address topics ranging from stellate cell activation to the role of NITs to the importance of patient advocacy. As they move from post to post, Jörn and Roger provide context on where each one fits in the history of the podcast and what they learned or experienced as a result.
Of course, a podcast without Stephen or Louise can provide only so much of the podcast's history and key moments, but for listeners, this episode will give you an opportunity to reflect on your own intellectual journey with NAFLD and NASH and to ask yourself which of the older episodes and conversations you might want to revisit. As we noted earlier, we will post two episodes and six conversations we like to revisit in the week ahead.