Pioneering and internationally renowned cardiothoracic surgeon, Vaughn Starnes appointed 100th president of the American Association for Thoracic Surgery
A new study shows that a potential treatment for ischemia- reperfusion injury is safe for humans. Building upon three decades of preclinical animal studies, this NIH-funded trial demonstrated, for the first time, the safety of Regadenoson (an adenosine 2A receptor agonist) in human lung transplant patients.
When she turned 48, Lisa James of Arlington, Texas, decided she wanted to make the ultimate gift by donating one of her kidneys to a child she hadn’t met.
Founded in 2017, the navigator program works with both recipients and donors to identify needs and guide each through the process to transplantation and post-transplant.
In a first-ever advancement in human medicine and aviation technology, a University of Maryland unmanned aircraft has delivered a donor kidney to surgeons at the University of Maryland Medical Center in Baltimore for successful transplantation into a patient with kidney failure. This successful demonstration illustrates the potential of unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) for providing organ deliveries that, in many cases, could be faster, safer, and more widely available than traditional transport methods. The momentous flight was a collaboration between transplant physicians and researchers at the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore; aviation and engineering experts at the University of Maryland; the University of Maryland Medical Center; and collaborators at the Living Legacy Foundation of Maryland.
Alcohol Relapse Rate Among Liver Transplant Recipients Identical Whether or Not There is A 6-Month Wait Before Transplant 04/25/2019 AddThis Sharing Buttons Share to Facebook Share to TwitterShare to EmailShare to PrintShare to More Credit: Getty Images For decades, patients with liver disease related to alcohol use have been told they must be sober for six months before they can get a liver transplant. Many die before that six-month wait period is up. Now, a growing number of researchers are questioning that six-month waiting period.
It was in the Boy Scouts, decades before he came to Cedars-Sinai, that Dr. Nicholas Nissen, surgical director of Liver Transplantation, learned about going above and beyond the call of duty. On Thursday, April 25, he will receive one of the highest honors bestowed by Scouts USA: The rank of Distinguished Eagle Scout.
In 2017, in response to a lawsuit filed by a 21-year-old woman on the waiting list for lungs in New York City, a federal court order changed the policy covering the distribution of lungs donated for transplant. However, the policy change has had several unintended consequences, according to a new study from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The new policy has imposed a significant logistical burden on organ procurement organizations and surgical teams involved in retrieving the donated organs.
After Hermine Honarvar Rule was told that she was in critical need of a kidney transplant, two relatives and a friend each volunteered to give up a kidney to help save her. But during the screening process all three candidates were discovered to have health issues that would disqualify them from donating. Thankfully, her husband Mark turned out to be the right match for his wife. “We were truly made for each other,” he jokes today.
An anonymous living liver donor helped the UHN Transplant Program achieve a North American first with an innovative living liver donor exchange, or “swap,” that saved the lives of two failing liver patients, with the potential to save many more.
Here's a great story about a Kentucky woman who donated a kidney to a perfect stranger from New York who 21 years earlier had undergone a heart-liver transplant. The two women met on the Matching Donors website, a non-profit organization that provides a platform where patients and potential donors can meet. All three organ transplants took place at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles.
The Transplant Research and Education Center (TREC) at UCLA will launch the Living Donation Storytelling Project, a unique digital library of stories of people sharing their real experiences as living donors, recipients of living donor kidney transplants, and those in need of transplants.
Inspirational living kidney donor chain saves lives of two mothers; moving experience for donors
Grateful organ transplant patients and donor families spoke during Loyola Medicine's 28th annual Candle-Lighting Ceremony, an emotional event held during National Donate Life Month that honors organ donors.
Tim Lowell of Hernando, Mississippi, received the first total artificial heart in the state of Tennessee when the cardiac surgery team at Vanderbilt Health placed the device in his chest on Sept. 26, 2018. The mechanical heart kept him alive for nearly three months until a matching human donor heart became available and he was transplanted on Dec. 16, 2018, at Vanderbilt University Medical Center.
When transplant cardiologists at Debakey Heart and Vascular Center at Houston Methodist Hospital began using percutaneously placed axillary IABPs as a bridge to heart transplants, the CICU team had to develop mobilization and ambulation guidelines unique to these patients.
A University of Maryland Medicine team performed a rare bilateral lung-heart transplant on a 12-year-old girl. The surgery was done at the University of Maryland Children’s Hospital.
For the first time, a person living with HIV has donated a kidney to a transplant recipient also living with HIV. A multidisciplinary team from Johns Hopkins Medicine completed the living donor HIV-to-HIV kidney transplant on Mar. 25. The doctors say both the donor and the recipient are doing well.
The nondescript yet mysterious fatty tissue that hangs like an apron from the stomach – called the omentum – holds great promise for thousands of children born with hypoplastic left heart syndrome(HLHS) or other severe cardiac defects, who might need a heart transplant within their first 10 years of life. Using an animal model, researchers found that surgically attaching the omentum to the overburdened heart reduces signs of injury, allowing the heart to function normally. Their findings were published in the Annals of Thoracic Surgery.
In a surprising finding, researchers at the University of Michigan Rogel Cancer Center showed the protein NLRP6 aggravated the difficult symptoms of gastrointestinal graft-vs.-host disease. Knocking out this protein in mice led to significantly better survival and less severe GVHD.
On behalf of the more than 720,000 Americans with kidney failure whose lives depend on either a kidney transplant or dialysis to survive and their families, the 40 million Americans with kidney diseases, and the more than 20,000 ASN members who are physicians, scientists, nurses, and health professionals, ASN applauds the leadership of HHS Secretary Alex M. Azar, II, in confronting the issue of a three-year statutory restriction on Medicare coverage of immunosuppressant drugs following a kidney transplant. STATEMENT OF AMERICAN SOCIETY OF NEPHROLOGY (ASN) PRESIDENT MARK E. ROSENBERG, MD, FASN, ON HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES (HHS) SECRETARY AZAR’S ANNOUNCEMENT ON IMMUNOSUPPRESSIVE COVERAGE FOR KIDNEY TRANSPLANTS Washington, DC (March 15, 2019) – On behalf of the more than 720,000 Americans with kidney failure whose lives depend on either a kidney transplant or dialysis to survive and their families, the 40 million Americans with kidney diseases, and the more than 20,000 ASN members
• After examining comprehensive pathology findings and clinical, immunological, and outcome data pertaining to patients with transplant glomerulopathy, investigators identified 5 groups of patients with distinct features, as well as different outcomes in terms of survival rates of transplanted kidneys.
Joe Janusz, president of the Peoria-area River City Bowling Association, is looking forward to bowling again following his heart transplant at Loyola University Medical Center. "When I throw that first ball, I will know I've completed my recovery," he said. "And I plan for it to be a strike."
• Payments by organ transplant recipients and Medicare decreased significantly following the introduction of generic immunosuppressive medications. • Large differences in out-of-pocket payments for immunosuppressive medications between Part D beneficiaries who did and did not qualify for the Medicare low-income subsidy suggest that recipients with resources just above the threshold to qualify for the subsidy may experience considerable financial strain.
Nine patients at Penn Medicine have been cured of the Hepatitis C virus (HCV) following lifesaving heart transplants from deceased donors who were infected with the disease, according to a study published in the American Journal of Transplantation.
Needle biopsies detect rejection after a transplanted organ is already in trouble and sometimes miss the mark. And the needle damages tissue. This biocompatible nanoparticle goes to work at the first sign of trouble and could give clinicians much more information with a simple urine test.
NYU Langone Transplant Institute launches a new pancreas transplantation program, expanding regional access to care for people with complications from diabetes and other illnesses.
Stanford Graduate School of Business (GSB) Energy Club and Sustainable Business Club are hosting the inaugural Climate, Business and Innovation conference to inform the Stanford business community of the risks and opportunities presented by climate change.
A new case study out of New York University’s Steinhardt School of Culture, Education, and Human Development finds that face transplant surgery in patients who have experienced severe facial trauma can improve speech production.
Refrigeration is an essential component of the food supply chain, extending the shelf life of perishable food and ensuring that consumers receive safe food that does not pose a threat to their health. It is estimated that 40 percent of food products require refrigeration and that nine percent of losses of perishable foods are due to lack of refrigeration in developed countries. However, this level of refrigeration has an environmental cost; refrigeration accounts for 15 percent of the electricity consumed and the food cold chain represents one percent of CO2 emissions worldwide.
In this episode we chat with Pinar Zorlutuna, a professor in aerospace and mechanical engineering, who is using tissue engineering to extend the viability of hearts in a transplant scenario. In addition, we catch up with Sophia Bevacqua, an alumna who is working in art restoration at the Vatican Museums.
Researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have discovered clues to a particularly deadly form of rejection that can follow lung transplantation. Called antibody-mediated rejection, the condition remains impervious to available treatments and difficult to diagnose. The researchers have identified, in mice, a process that may prevent the condition and lead to possible therapies to treat it.
For a patient awaiting a new organ – namely a liver or kidney – living donation provides a viable alternative and can often shorten a recipient’s wait time.
Research in animal models suggest that liver cancers with a mutation in the β-catenin gene could respond to treatment with rapamycin, a commonly used immunosupressant.
Kidney transplant recipients are now benefiting from donor organs that do not match their blood type but are compatible and just as safe, according to a Vanderbilt University Medical Center study in the Journal of the American College of Surgeons.
Xenotransplantation—transplanting organs from animals into humans—is one step closer to becoming a possibility for infants awaiting human heart transplantation.
Pig heart transplants could potentially save the lives of infants with life-threatening heart diseases.
A new study in the journal Gastroenterology reveals that the standard method for ranking patients on the waitlist for lifesaving liver transplantation may not prioritize some of the sickest candidates for the top of the list.
Patients and providers now have instant access to Tennessee’s only full-service transplant center on their smartphones and mobile devices.
The proportion of liver transplants in the United States for alcohol-associated liver disease increased between 2002 and 2016, with much of the increase associated with a decrease in liver transplant for hepatitis C virus infection because of antiviral therapy. This observational study used data from the United Network for Organ Sharing for all liver transplants during the 15-year period and the national study group consisted of nearly 33,000 patients, including 9,438 patients with a diagnosis of alcohol-associated liver disease. Study findings suggest five-year survival after transplant was lower in patients with alcohol-associated liver disease.
The American Society of Transplant Surgeons (ASTS) has accredited Loyola Medicine to offer a prestigious two-year fellowship in liver and kidney transplant surgery.
Study led by St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital found treatment guided by measuring minimal residual disease was associated with better outcomes for hypodiploid acute lymphoblastic leukemia patients
• Whole-exome sequencing of blood or saliva revealed a genetic diagnosis of kidney disease in 32.7% of pediatric kidney transplant recipients. • The findings indicate that such a sequencing strategy may help individualize pre- and post-transplant care for many young kidney transplant recipients.
The American Society of Transplant Surgeons (ASTS) has accredited Loyola Medicine to offer a prestigious two-year fellowship in liver and kidney transplant surgery. The first fellow will begin in July, 2020.
A study by UCLA researchers is the first to demonstrate a technique for coaxing pluripotent stem cells — which can give rise to every cell type in the body and which can be grown indefinitely in the lab — into becoming mature T cells capable of killing tumor cells.
Organ transplant rejection is a major problem in transplantation medicine. Suppressing the immune system to prevent organ rejection, however, opens the door to life-threatening infections. Researchers at the University of Basel's Biozentrum have now discovered a molecular approach preventing rejection of the transplanted graft while simultaneously maintaining the ability to fight against infections.
In a randomized clinical trial, researchers compared the effect of a stem cell transplant using a non-myeloablative regimen (a lower-dose, short course of more tolerable immune specific chemotherapy and antibodies to suppress the immune system) versus continuing disease-modifying therapy in 110 patients with relapsing-remitting multiple sclerosis.
Poo transplant or “Faecal microbiota transplantation” (FMT) can successfully treat patients with ulcerative colitis, new research from the University of Adelaide shows.
Vanderbilt University Medical Center (VUMC) set a new record for total transplants among its five organ specialties in 2018 with more than 500 transplants.
Liver transplant patients over time experience an increasing trend toward colon cancer and non-Hodgkin lymphoma, according to a study led by a Loyola Medicine gastroenterologist. The study also found that lung and heart transplant patients have a higher trend toward non-melanoma skin cancer.
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