Determined to explore every option that could save her daughter’s life

In the same year that Martine Rothblatt announced a public redefinition of her identity, she confronted an experience every parent fears. Her seven-year-old daughter Jenesis was diagnosed with primary pulmonary hypertension (PPH), an incurable malady of the lungs that her doctors predicted would end her life within a few years. Determined to explore every option that could save her daughter’s life, Rothblatt created the PPH Cure Foundation to mobilize research efforts.

Suspending her business concerns, Martine Rothblatt set out to learn everything she could about her daughter’s illness, giving herself a crash course in biology, a subject she had last studied in 10th grade. Her research quicky led her into the complex issues around organ transplantation, particularly the use of animal organs in human medical treatment (xenotransplantation). Rothblatt undertook a doctoral course in medical ethics at the London School of Medicine and Dentistry, commonly known as Barts (for St. Bartholomew’s Hospital), part of the University of London system. Frustrated with the slow pace of the search for a cure, and confident that she could manage a superior research effort, Rothblatt founded a new medical biotechnology company, United Therapeutics, in 1996.

Meanwhile, Rothblatt’s activities in telecommunications continued to bear fruit. She helped pioneer airship internet services with her Sky Station project in 1997, persuading the FCC to allocate frequencies for airship-based internet services. The same year, she left the last of her telecommunications commitments, leadership of WorldSpace, to become the full-time Chairman and CEO of United Therapeutics.

Over the next few years, United Therapeutics developed Orenitram, an effective medication for pulmonary hypertension. Jenesis Rothblatt grew to adulthood and became an executive with the business that had saved her life. Thousands who would have otherwise died are now living and using this medication. Since then, the company has created a treatment for neuroblastoma, a cancer that most often arises in the adrenal glands. This too has saved thousands of lives. United Therapeutics is now pursuing methods to manufacture a virtually unlimited supply of substitute organs for transplant. These methods include repairing donated organs previously considered too damaged for transplant, and xenotransplantation — adapting animal organs for human use.

https://achievement.org/achiever/martine-rothblatt-ph-d/