|
February 2021 | Inside the Issue
|
|
|
|
|
Black History in Nephrology
|
|
|
This Black History Month, we are highlighting 2 Black Nephrologists and their contributions to the treatment of CKD.
|
|
|
|
Research Highlight
|
|
|
Dr. Shuchi Anand received an R01 Award from the NIH to fund her research on CKDu.
|
|
|
|
Celebrating Colleagues
|
|
|
Our colleagues have a lot to celebrate this month, from presentations to travel awards and more.
|
|
|
|
|
|
Nephrology family and friends,
It is a tremendous honor to take on the role of Division Chief. Having started as a fellow here nearly 14 years ago, I know firsthand just how amazing the people in our division are. In this new role, I am finding out even more about all the accomplishments of the faculty, fellows and staff that make Stanford Nephrology such a special place. I can’t wait to learn more and to continue to support the work you all do. Enjoy these updates and please contribute to the next newsletter by emailing nephrology-news@stanford.edu.
Dr. Tara Chang
Division Chief
|
|
Black History in Nephrology
|
|
|
This Black History Month, we are highlighting some of the many contributions that Black Nephrologists have made and are currently making to the research and treatment of Chronic Kidney Disease.
|
|
|
|
Dr. Samuel Lee Kountz was a renowned surgeon and pioneer in organ transplants. During his residency at Stanford University School of Medicine, Dr. Kountz focused on surgery, becoming particularly interested in kidney transplants. In 1961 Dr. Kountz and Dr. Roy Cohn, another leading surgeon, performed the first successful kidney transplant between two people who were not twins. In 1967, Dr. Kountz became Chief of the Kidney Transplant Service at University of California at San Francisco (UCSF), where he worked with Dr. Folker Belzer to create the Belzer kidney perfusion machine. This innovation kept kidneys alive for 50 hours after being removed from the donor. Through Dr. Kountz’s involvement at UCSF, the institution’s kidney transplant research center became one the best in the country. Dr. Kountz also created the Center for Human Values at UCSF to discuss ethical issues concerning transplants.
|
|
|
|
Dr. Bessie Young is a Professor of Medicine in the Division of Nephrology at the University of Washington. Young’s research focuses primarily on chronic kidney disease (CKD), diabetes complications and comorbidities, and health disparities in minority populations with CKD. She has an impressive record of identifying previously undiscovered disparities between white and minority populations with CKD. She was the first to identify a greater prevalence and incidence of diabetic nephropathy and greater risk of amputations in minority populations than in white populations, conversely finding that minorities tend to have less cardiovascular disease and a greater chance of survival than white populations on dialysis when access to care is comparable. Young has also been a pioneer in discovering an association between CKD and depression, finding a higher rate of death in depressed diabetic patients with late-stage CKD than in patients with the same condition that were not depressed. One of her more recent publications in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that a collaborative approach to care for patients with comorbid chronic illnesses and depression decreased blood pressure, lipids, hemoglobin A1c and depression.
|
|
|
Faculty member Dr. Shuchi Anand received an R01 award from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to fund research on CKDu
|
|
|
Faculty member Dr. Shuchi Anand has received an NIH R01 award for her CKDu research entitled "Chronic Kidney Disease of Unknown Etiology: Applying a Multidisciplinary Approach to Investigate the World's Most Common Tubulointerstitial Kidney Disease."
In a statement on the public health relevance of this project, Dr. Anand explains that in many regions of the world, agricultural workers are dying at high rates due to a mysterious kidney disease, their kidneys irreversibly scarred without an obvious insult. Dr. Anand and her team plan to investigate the cause of this epidemic of a chronic kidney disease of unknown cause (CKDu), with parallel epidemiologic and molecular tools, basing their work in Sri Lanka, because it is a ‘hotspot’ where the causative exposure is likely to exist in abundance. However, since other regions of the world, including the U.S., are affected, Dr. Anand's multi-disciplinary approach has the potential to identify and prevent an unknown cause of kidney disease affecting vulnerable agricultural populations worldwide.
|
|
|
Summer is the newest addition to the Stanford Nephrology family
|
|
Presentations
Fellow Dr. Ayesha Anwaar has been selected to present her case “A Sweet Pleural Effusion: A Rare Complication of Peritoneal Dialysis” at the 2021 Annual Dialysis Conference presented by the University of Missouri Division of Nephrology. Congratulations Dr. Anwaar!
Awards
Fellowship Coordinator Cayla Whitney received the 2021 GME Coordinator Travel Award for cover the cost of the ACGME Annual Educational Conference. Keep up the great work, Cayla, and enjoy the conference!
Committee Work
Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO), a workgroup Division Chief Dr. Tara Chang served on has just published the 2021 Clinical Practice Guidelines for the Management of Blood Pressure in CKD. Congratulations on the achievement of this years-long endeavor, Dr. Chang and the KDIGO group!
Staff Leadership
Administrative Coordinator Winnie Ellerman has been selected for the Department of Medicine's Leadership Development Program for Non-Academic Staff. Congratulations Winnie!
World Skiing Championships
Now for something completely different! Demetri Maxim, a graduate student researcher in Dr. Vivek Bhalla's lab is a world-class skiier in his free time. Last week, he skiied in the World Alpine Skiing Championships in Italy and placed 39th in the world in the Giant Slalom event. Go Demetri, go!
|
|
|
February 12 marked Lunar New Year and the beginning of the Year of the Ox on the Chinese zodiac calendar
|
|
Happy New Year to all those celebrating! If you feel so inclined, please reply to this email to share how you celebrated the holiday.
And as a reminder, staff members are welcome to join our daily huddles anytime for division updates, fun themes and even music lessons. Reach out to neph-admin@stanford.edu for zoom information.
|
|
|
|
New Publications from our Team
|
|
|
Bolanos CG, Pham NM, Mair RD, Meyer TW, Sirich TL. Metabolomic analysis of uremic pruritus in patients on hemodialysis. PLoS One. 2021 Feb 12;16(2):e0246765. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0246765. PMID: 33577623; PMCID: PMC7880487.
Cheng XS, Han J, Stedman MR, Chertow GM, Tan JC. And Then There Were Three: Effects of Pretransplant Dialysis on Multiorgan Transplantation. Transplant Direct. 2021 Jan 15;7(2):e657. doi: 10.1097/TXD.0000000000001112. PMID: 33490382; PMCID: PMC7817305.
Gray Z, Tu W, Chertow GM, Bhalla V. Aldosterone sensitivity: an opportunity for investigation into the pathogenesis of hypertension. Am J Physiol Renal Physiol. 2021 Jan 25. doi: 10.1152/ajprenal.00415.2020. Epub ahead of print. PMID: 33491565.
|
|
|
If you haven't done so yet and you received the ACGME Survey link, please complete the survey before April 2021.
Please share any feedback you have directly with us, anonymously or not, using the feedback form on our website.
|
|
Do you have news to share in the next newsletter? Send it to nephrology-news@stanford.edu
|
|
|
|
|
|
