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Black patients with kidney disease face greater health care burdens

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Shawn M. Carter

Underrepresented groups with kidney disease face greater health care burdens due to psychological and structural factors, such as stigma and institutional racism, data show.

“Racial and ethnic minority groups in the United States are disproportionately affected by chronic kidney disease and progressive kidney failure, and face significantly more socioeconomic challenges,” Merav Shohet, PhD, of the department of anthropology, Boston University College & Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, and colleagues wrote. Read the full story in Healio.

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A Pig Kidney Was Just Transplanted Into a Human Body, and It Is Still Working

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By Tanya Lewis, Jeffrey DelViscio, Alexis Lim

Xenotransplants could help to solve the organ transplant crisis—if researchers can get the science right.

Full Transcript

Tanya Lewis: I’m standing on the rooftop of NYU Langone Health, a hospital in midtown Manhattan, scanning the sky over the East River for a helicopter. It’s New York City, so there are tons of helicopters, but I’m looking for a specific one. Read the full transcript or listen to the interview in Scientific American.

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Vascular disease, diabetes among risks in years after lung transplant

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Routine monitoring of these patients urged to avoid serious health complications

By Lindsey Shapiro, PhD

Rates of metabolic and cardiovascular complications — from diabetes and kidney issues to hypertension and abnormal blood-fat levels — increased in the years following a lung transplant among people with cystic fibrosis (CF), according to a recent analysis in the Netherlands.

These findings emphasize a need for routine monitoring of transplant patients, its researchers noted. “Early recognition of these complications is crucial and will lead to earlier intervention, which could lead to improved prognosis after lung transplantation,” they wrote.
Read the full story in Cystic Fibrosis News Today.

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Q&A: 1-year anniversary of registry to advance pulmonary fibrosis research

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By Isabella Hornick and Joseph Lasky, MD

Given the rarity of pulmonary fibrosis, pulmonologists are constantly seeking to know more about the disease and advance research on treatment options.

Two valuable resources for this research come from the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation (PFF) through its Patient Registry and Community Registry, the latter of which just celebrated its 1-year anniversary.
Read the full story in Healio.

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First 10 drugs chosen for Medicare price negotiations

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By Emma Bascom

HHS announced the first 10 drugs that will be subject to Medicare price negotiations.

The Inflation Reduction Act, a law meant to lower health care costs for millions of Americans, included a provision that allows Medicare to negotiate the costs of prescription drugs. In 2022, Medicare enrollees who were taking the drugs chosen for negotiations paid a total of $3.4 billion in out-of-pocket costs, according to a press release from HHS.
Read the full story in Healio.

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An inside look at COVID’s lasting damage to the lungs

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By Jeremy White, Pam Belluck, Noah Bassetti-Blum and Eleanor Lutz

More than three years after the start of the pandemic, many COVID-19 survivors continue to struggle. Some, especially those who became so severely ill that they were hospitalized and unable to breathe on their own, face lasting lung damage.

To better understand the long-term impact of COVID’s assault on the lungs, The New York Times spoke with three patients who were hospitalized during the pandemic’s early waves, interviewed doctors who treated them and reviewed CT scans of their lungs over time.
Read the full story from The New York Times.

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Psychological distress may be linked to poor self-management of chronic kidney disease

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By Shawn M. Carter

Psychological distress may be linked to poor self-management of chronic kidney disease, according to a recently published study of patients with CKD who were not on dialysis.

“Beginning with the diagnosis of chronic kidney disease (CKD) onward, patients are confronted with profound changes that require extensive emotional skills. An additional burden is adhering to disease self-management recommendations,” lead researcher Cinderella K. Cardol, PhD, of the health, medical and neuropsychology unit at Leiden University in The Netherlands, and colleagues wrote. 
Read the full story in Healio.

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Join the fight for continued access to non-invasive testing!

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What is going on?

Medicare coverage for post-transplant tests, such as CareDx’s AlloMap and AlloSure, is being reviewed. The transplant community now has the opportunity to share comments and letters on the importance of these tests and how restricting access to these tests could negatively impact patients and their post-transplant health.

Why does this matter to you?

AlloMap and AlloSure help detect issues, such as rejection, with transplants earlier than traditional testing, while also helping patients avoid invasive procedures like biopsies. These tests have been trusted by the transplant community for over 15 years for heart transplant recipients, over 5 years in kidney transplant recipients, and over 2 years in lung transplant recipients.

New proposed coverage for these tests is more restrictive. If these new restrictions are put in place, it could limit access to these important tests. This could prevent your care team from being able to order these blood tests to check on how your transplant is doing when they think it is needed.

How can you help?

The patient voice is powerful and deserves to be heard on this important issue! From now until September 23, 2023, you can send a comment or letter to the groups making these decisions, voicing your perspective on the importance of these tests and need for continued access. 

While doing so in your own words is best, we have created the below prompts to help. To start your letter, select at least one of the prompts below that feels best for you and answer it in your own words. Be sure to include what kind of transplant you have had, a little bit about your own transplant story, and how non-invasive tests like AlloSure or AlloMap have impacted your post-transplant care.

Click here to learn more and start your letter!

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Catheter ablation safe, effective for AF in patients awaiting heart transplant

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By Scott Buzby

In patients with end-stage HF awaiting transplant, catheter ablation for atrial fibrillation was safe and effective and was associated with improvements in left ventricular ejection fraction and AF burden, a speaker reported.

The duration of follow-up was intended to be 3 years, but due to the number of clinical events, the trial data safety monitoring board recommended to stop the study prematurely at 1.5 years. Read the full story in Healio.

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