| AAKP News of the Month: Purchase Tickets for Medal of Excellence Award Reception
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Tickets to attend the2009 Medal of Excellence Award Reception are available! During the reception, AAKP will honor the 2009 Medal of Excellence Award recipient, Robert Schrier, MD, for his outstanding devotion and accomplishments in the renal field.
The reception takes place March 22 at the Renaissance Harborplace Hotel in Baltimore, MD, from 7 p.m. - 9 p.m. To purchase tickets for this elegant event, please call (800) 749-AAKP or click here to purchase tickets online.
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| Join AAKP! |
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| New AAKP Membership Levels and Benefits |
 AAKP is excited to offer new membership levels and benefits for patients, family members, health care professionals, physicians and health care institutions. AAKP hopes these new benefits will increase awareness and education about kidney disease and its affects.
- Principal membership - aakpRENALIFE: Cost is $15 per year. Members receive a subscription of aakpRENALIFE, among other membership benefits.
- Principal membership - Kidney Beginnings: The Magazine: Cost is $15 each year. Members receive a subscription of Kidney Beginnings: The Magazine, among other benefits.
- Premiere Patient/Family membership: Cost is $25 per year. Members receive subscriptions to aakpRENALIFE and Kidney Beginnings: The Magazine, as well as other membership benefits, including discounts on the AAKP Annual Convention.
New Professional AAKP members receive two six month trial Premiere membership to give to their patients. They also receive all AAKP magazines and other membership perks.
In addition to original benefits, AAKP physician members now receive five six month Premiere patient/family membership to distribute to patients. They may also order bulk AAKP materials at a 5 percent discounted rate.
Institutional members of AAKP receive a 5 percent discount on bulk orders of AAKP materials, and ten six month Premiere patient/family memberships to distribute.
For more information about AAKP membership levels and benefits, please visit the AAKP Web site. |
| Access to Donated Kidneys Declines with Age for Women |
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Researchers discovered women between ages 18 and 45 had the same access to transplants as men. Women between the ages of 46 and 55 had 3 percent less access, women aged 56 to 65 years had 15 percent less access, women aged 66 to 75 had 29 percent less access and women over 75 years old had 59 percent less access to a kidney transplant.
The findings of this study may help researchers develop ways to reduce disparities in kidney allocation. |
| Urine Test Detects Cause of Transplant Failure |
According to a study in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, a new and simple urine test can detect polyomavirus nephropathy, a new and serious complication that effects about 9 percent of kidney transplant recipients. The test could lead to better diagnosis and treatment of patients with this condition.
Polyomaviruses harmlessly infects many adults, although they can be a serious problem for individuals who have compromised immune systems. Currently, there is no effective treatment for polyomavirus nephropathy, so it is important to diagnose the condition as early as possible. Treatment therapy may consist of lowering doses of immunosuppressive medication and hoping for natural viral clearance. |
Transplant Survival for HIV-Positive Patients Can Be Long Term
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The study found HIV-positive transplant recipients had an 87.9 percent one year survival rate compared to 94.6 percent of transplant recipients without HIV. Although HIV-positive recipients took longer to gain full function of the transplanted kidney, they had equal kidney and patient survival compared to HIV-negative recipients.
Traditionally, HIV patients were not considered transplant candidates because survival rates after transplantation were thought to be greatly compromised by the disease, which cripples the body's immune system. Transplant patients also take drugs that suppress their immune systems in order to prevent organ rejection, a regimen thought to further threaten their already fragile immune systems. | |
| New Test Could Increase Availability of Organs |
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This allows transplant surgeons to use an organ from a healthy 70-year-old knowing it is in better condition than an organ from an unhealthy 50-year-old, which would have been expected to function better because it was younger.
By comparing genetic signs of biological aging with biochemical markers related to kidney function, doctors will be able to better predict how long transplanted kidneys will last. |
| Predicting Future Kidney Function with Older Donor Kidneys |
 Research published in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology has begun to establish a method for projecting future kidney function of potential donor kidneys. This could help thousands of individuals waiting to receive a kidney transplant by determining if older kidneys will function well enough in the future.
The goal of the study is to find good criteria for predicting which older kidneys are better and how long they will last in transplant patients. Researchers determine the health of a potential donor kidney by how quickly the glomeruli do their job of filtering waste products from the bloodstream. |
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 Astellas Pharma US, Inc. is proud to sponsor this edition of Kidney Transplant Today. | |
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A Johns Hopkins study discovered 
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