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Act of kindness: Former college roommate to donate part of his liver to save his friend

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The college roommates had not seen each other in 21 years. But when Steven Robinson realized on a family trip to Detroit that he was within driving distance of Richard Koonce, he called his friend to ask if he could visit. 

Koonce had introduced Robinson to his wife, Natalie, when they all attended Norfolk State University, a historically Black college in Virginia. When his old friend reached out he welcomed the couple and their three children to his home in Sandusky, Ohio, last summer.
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Top 10 Tips for Reducing Salt in Your Diet

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When it comes to dietary sodium, less is certainly best, yet Americans today consume 50% more than the recommended daily quantities of sodium. Diets high in sodium increase blood pressure levels. High blood pressure damages the kidneys over time, and is a leading cause of kidney failure.  

To help Americans reduce salt intake to the ideal one teaspoon per day, the National Kidney Foundation and Council of Renal Nutrition member Linda Ulrich offer 10 tips to reduce sodium in your diet. Read more.

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Researchers report third case of HIV remission after stem cell transplant using umbilical cord blood

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(CNN)A US woman has become the third known person who’s gone into HIV remission, and the first mixed-race woman, thanks to a transplant of stem cells from umbilical cord blood, according to research presented at a conference Tuesday.

The woman, whom the researchers described as middle-aged and of mixed race, was diagnosed with acute myeloid leukemia four years after an HIV diagnosis, according to an abstract from the Conference on Retroviruses and Opportunistic Infections.
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Groundbreaking Heart-Lung Procedure Gives Toddler a Chance at a Full Life

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Stanford heart team combines two highly complex specialties in a novel PARplant procedure

Santana Renchie takes on life as if she knows—at the tender age of 2—that she’s lucky to be alive. She’s sassy, full of joy, and determined to not miss a single moment of fun.

“There’s nothing stopping her. She’s relentless. If she wants something, she just goes for it,” says her dad, Sebron. Read the full story.

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Gene Pierce – The Legacy of an Organ Donation, Transportation, and Transplantation Pioneer

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60 years ago, Gene Pierce was a Sunday school teacher and Boy Scout troop leader in his free time. For his day job, he worked in the marketing department at Chesapeake Pulp and Paper Mill in West Point, Virginia—where he was instrumental in developing Green Life Fertilizer.1

When Gene found out that he and his wife were expanding their family to five children, he realized he needed to make a little more money. There happened to be two job openings at the time that interested him: One at the railroad company and the other at Medical College of Virginia (MCV). Read the full story.

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Walking daily correlates with high health-related quality of life in adults with CKD

Photo by Arek Adeoye on Unsplash
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Adults with chronic kidney disease who walked between 7,000 and 12,000 steps a day reported high health-related quality of life, according to data published in the Journal of Renal Nutrition.

“Recent studies have shown that walking, as a daily form exercise in patients with CKD, may improve cardiopulmonary function, and regulate blood pressure, blood glucose and lipid levels in patients with CKD; moreover, it plays a vital role in enhancing the quality of life of CKD patients,” JiachuanXiong, MD, from the department of nephrology at the Key Laboratory for the Prevention and Treatment of CKD of Chongqing Clinical Research Center of Kidney and Urology Diseases in Xinqiao Hospital at Army Medical University in China, and colleagues wrote. Read the full story.

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Survival High With Lung Transplant for COVID-19-Associated ARDS

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MONDAY, Feb. 14, 2022 (HealthDay News) — Lung transplantation is successful for patients with COVID-19-associated acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS), with high survival, according to a study published online Jan. 27 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Chitaru Kurihara, M.D., from Northwestern University in Chicago, and colleagues conducted a retrospective case series of 102 patients who underwent a lung transplant between Jan. 21, 2020, and Sept. 30, 2021, including 30 patients with COVID-19-associated ARDS.
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CDC Cuts Booster Interval for the Immunocompromised

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The CDC updated its interim guidance on COVID-19 vaccination to give immunocompromised people a shorter wait for their booster shot.

It is now recommended that people who are moderately or severely immunocompromised receive a booster 3 months — down from 5 months previously — after the third dose of an mRNA vaccine, for a total of four doses. Previewed at last week’s meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), this change was attributed to concern about the immune response and loss of mRNA protection over time for these patients.
Read the full story.

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On National Donor Day, organ recipient breaks down misinformation

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On New Year’s Day, USC junior Selah Kitchiner floated down Colorado Boulevard on a conveyance both dazzling and ephemeral. The purple and gold 2022 Donate Life Rose Parade float was covered in roses, sunflowers and seaweed with Venetian columns and arches that rose two stories. Kitchiner was just above street level, posing as a gondolier, oar in hand. No rowing was required, though she did plenty of waving during her hour-long Rose Parade ride.

“I waved to anybody with a USC chair or sweatshirt, anybody who made eye contact,” Kitchiner said. “If a spectator was daydreaming and they saw me wave at them, they would kind of snap out of it.” Read the full story.

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