Feature Channels: Kidney Disease

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• In an analysis of data from a recent clinical trial, researchers found that removing a race-based adjustment in the estimation of individuals’ kidney function had a small but potentially important impact on the inclusion of participants, with differing effects on Black and non-Black participants. • Removal of the race-based adjustment also influenced inclusion parameters such as participants’ severity of kidney function impairment at baseline as well as their risk of developing cardiovascular- and kidney-related outcomes.

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With the pandemic, there has been a rise in the use of virtual appointments for patients seeking health care. A new study by Tufts researchers, however, suggests that for many older and chronically ill patients, telehealth appointments may be most effective when they augment in-person health-care visits rather than fully replace them.

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Cancer, infections and heart disease pose the greatest risk to kidney transplant recipients ― not organ rejection ― according to a recently published Mayo Clinic study. Researchers discovered that recipient death due to factors other than organ rejection is the leading cause for transplanted kidney loss. Only 1 in 4 transplanted kidney losses were caused by organ rejection.

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A new analysis of national kidney transplant and organ discard data concludes that too many deceased donor organs with acute kidney injury (AKI) may be needlessly going to waste because of a change in the way kidneys are evaluated.

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Rising temperatures due to climate change will lead to an increase in cases of kidney stones over the next seven decades, even if measures are put in place to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, according to a new study by researchers at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP). Based on data from South Carolina, the study found the increase will be steeper if no action is taken, but an uptick will occur even with mitigation actions, costing the state healthcare system approximately $57 million in the latter scenario and $99 million if nothing is done. The findings were published today in Scientific Reports.

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With an $8 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the next stage of the THINKER project — called THINKER-NEXT — will aim to provide a comprehensive view of the risks and benefits of transplanting HCV-infected kidneys into non-infected patients.

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Survey results indicate that there’s a global shortage of dietitians to provide kidney nutrition care, and many patients with kidney disease who need nutritional interventions either do not receive them or receive suboptimal therapy with inadequate monitoring.

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Kidney transplants from deceased donors function for a median of 10 to 15 years. New research indicates that when a kidney transplant fails, retransplantation may offer better survival patients compared with undergoing dialysis.

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Penn Medicine has been awarded a prestigious seven-year, $14 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to promote organ transplantation for patients with end-stage renal disease who are currently on the waitlist for a kidney transplant. The team will launch a clinical trial harnessing synthetic chimeric antigen receptor (CAR) T cells – a form of which was developed at Penn Medicine and became the first personalized cellular therapy for cancer – for use in patients for whom a compatible kidney cannot be found due to pre-existing antibodies against potential donors.

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• New research indicates that many kidney transplant recipients may not be adequately protected against emerging SARS-CoV-2 variants with the standard COVID-19 vaccination regimens currently used in the healthy general population.

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The anti-cancer effect of the drug may help those with rare, hereditary cancer syndromes avoid surgeries by shrinking tumors via a daily oral dose.

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A new review explores the physiology behind and proposed management strategies for body-wide symptoms of the post-acute sequelae of SARS-CoV-2 (PASC), otherwise known as “long COVID.” The review is published ahead of print in the American Journal of Physiology-Cell Physiology.

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• Survey results indicate that acute kidney injury (AKI) has significant impacts on individuals’ physical and emotional health, as well as on their work and family life. • Only about half of respondents rated medical team communication about AKI as very/extremely good.

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• Video-based telemedicine is used to facilitate care across all stages of chronic kidney disease. • Video-based telemedicine has evolved in recent years to be less reliant on specialized equipment and has allowed patients to receive kidney care in a location of their choice. • Further work is needed on approaches to sustainable integration and minimizing barriers to access.

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For most children with renal masses, the standard of care has long been to remove the entire affected kidney—which is the protocol for Wilms tumor, the most common kidney cancer in children. But is it possible for surgeons to perform partial nephrectomies in some patients with renal masses—safely removing the mass, but leaving the child’s kidney in place?Pediatric urologist Andy Chang, MD, Vice Chair of Operations for the Department of Surgery at Children’s Hospital Los Angeles, recently led a study to investigate this question, and he will present the results in December at The Societies for Pediatric Urology Fall Congress in Miami.

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Using high-frequency waves, the new treatment pushes smaller stones from the bottom of the kidney toward the ureter. The procedure allows for an office visit instead of surgery.

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Funded by a Specialized Program of Research Excellence (SPORE) award from the National Cancer Institute (NCI), the Kidney Cancer Program (KCP) at UT Southwestern’s Harold C. Simmons Comprehensive Cancer Center reports the largest and most diverse catalog of kidney cancer tumor models to date.