Dr. Melissa Cousino is a pediatric transplant psychologist and Professor of Pediatrics and Cardiac Surgery at the University of Michigan. She serves as Director of M-COPE, the Psychosocial Services and Research Program for the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital Congenital Heart Center, leading efforts to expand mental health care access, advance psychosocial research, and train future clinicians. Dr. Cousino is also the PI and study chair for the NIH-funded WE BEAT trial, leading a multisite, randomized clinical trial of her resilience-focused, telemedicine intervention for youth with congenital heart disease. Her research program, supported by the National Institutes of Health, centers on healthcare communication, decision making, and mental health in pediatric advanced heart disease and solid organ transplantation. She serves on scientific committees for a number of national and international cardiac and transplant organizations such as the International Society for Heart and Lung Transplantation and ACTION, and she is honored to serve as the 2027 Scientific Program Chair for the ISHLT Annual Meeting in Sydney, Australia – the first even non-MD for this large international meeting.