To build the program, Gruessner hired Dr. Horacio Rilo as director of cellular transplantation and invested in a $1 million “clean room” necessary for the procedure. Rilo had built an internationally recognized program at the University of Cincinnati.

While the hospital is still doing kidney and liver transplants, it has not done any pediatric liver transplants since 2012, when gastroenterologist and transplant specialist Dr. Khalid Khan left the hospital.

“We had a great start. For pediatric liver transplants we quickly became one of the top 25 percent of programs in the country, not only in numbers, but survivors,” said Khan, who came to Tucson from the University of Minnesota and now is an associate professor of pediatrics at Georgetown University.

In 2007, there was just one pediatric liver transplant at the UA Medical Center, according to the federal Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network. With Khan in place, that number spiked to 13 in 2008.

The hospital performed 36 pediatric liver transplants while Khan was on the staff. There hasn’t been another since he left, and UA Medical Center officials said on Friday that both the pediatric liver and kidney transplant programs are inactive.