Tag Archive for: kidney transplant

Marva Moxey-Mims

Revolutionizing pediatric nephrology one patient at a time

Marva Moxey-Mims

“With each kidney transplant, we’re not just restoring the health of children, we’re pioneering progress and setting new benchmarks for the field of pediatric nephrology,” says Marva Moxey-Mims, M.D., chief of Nephrology at Children’s National Hospital.

“With each kidney transplant, we’re not just restoring the health of children, we’re pioneering progress and setting new benchmarks for the field of pediatric nephrology,” says Marva Moxey-Mims, M.D., chief of Nephrology at Children’s National Hospital. “We offer not just treatment, but a chance for our patients to flourish and live their best life.”

Big picture

The Kidney Transplantation Program at Children’s National is the only one of its kind in the Washington, D.C., region focused on the needs of children and teens with kidney disease.

Performing an average of 15-20 kidney transplants per year, the program’s latest one- and three-year graft and patient survival data from the Scientific Registry for Transplant Recipients is 100%.

“Our program surpasses national numbers, reflecting a commitment to exceptional care, superior patient outcomes and a focus on setting a new standard for excellence in transplant support,” says Dr. Moxey-Mims.

Children’s National leads the way

At the forefront of groundbreaking treatment, the nephrology team is pioneering progress by providing innovative care and resources. One example is the hospital’s collaboration with the National Kidney Registry and MedStar Georgetown Transplant Institute’s Living Donor Program. This provides a greater chance of finding more suitable donors for difficult-to-match children and has resulted in altruistic donations.

“Through living kidney donations, we redefine the timeline for pediatric transplants. Children experience shorter waits and swifter paths to renewed health compared to the national wait list,” says Asha Moudgil, M.D., medical director of the Kidney Transplantation Program at Children’s National. “It’s a testament to our commitment to making a difference in every child’s life.”

That commitment is also seen in the hospital’s focus on making sure families have the resources they need during their medical journey.

“Caring for a child with renal disease is an immense challenge, not only for the young patients but also for their families. The demanding schedule of hospital visits, often three times a week, adds an extra layer of stress and disruption to daily life,” says Dr. Moudgil.

Through grant funding from donors and national programs, families with children undergoing kidney transplants and dialysis can receive financial assistance. In some cases, families receive up to $2,000 of mortgage or rental payment assistance. Families can also receive funds for medication co-pays and other expenses incurred around the time of the transplant.

“In the face of medical adversity, these funds become a source of support,” says Dr. Moudgil. “We make sure every family, regardless of financial constraints, can access the care and resources their child needs.”

Bottom line

Children’s National is at the forefront of pediatric kidney transplantation. “Our unique approach ensures every facet of a patient’s journey is considered,” says Dr. Moxey-Mims. “We’ve created an environment where success is not just a medical outcome but a comprehensive and sustained improvement in a child’s overall quality of life.”

Learn more about our latest advances in pediatric Nephrology.

dialysis machines

Profit facility status linked to longer wait times for kidney transplants

dialysis machines

Researchers found that profit dialysis facility status was associated with longer wait-listing times and kidney transplants.

Care of adults at profit versus nonprofit dialysis facilities has been associated with lower access to kidney transplants.

In a study published in JAMA, Celina Brunson, M.D., nephrologist and medical director of dialysis at Children’s National Hospital, and a cohort of researchers, found that profit facility status was associated with longer wait-listing times and kidney transplants. Whether there was a correlation in profit status was unknown before this study.

Researchers reviewed the United States (US) Renal Data System records of 13,333 pediatric patients under the age of 18 who started dialysis from the year 2000 through 2018 in U.S. dialysis facilities. This was followed up through June 30, 2019. Results showed that among U.S. pediatric patients undergoing dialysis, profit dialysis facility status was significantly associated with increased time to wait-listing and kidney transplants.

The full study can be viewed here.

colored illustration of kidney x-ray

Partnership with CMS and HRSA addresses national kidney shortage

colored illustration of kidney x-ray

Children’s National Hospital is proud to announce that it is participating in the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) and Health Resources & Services Administration (HRSA)’s new End-Stage Renal Disease Treatment Choices Learning Collaborative (ETCLC). This effort will focus on addressing kidney disease prevention and treatment, including improved access to kidney transplants in the United States.

The ETCLC will engage transplant centers, Organ Procurement Organizations (OPOs), large donor hospitals, patients and donor family members to identify highly effective practices currently in use and spread the use of these practices throughout the organ procurement, kidney care and kidney transplant community to achieve the following three AIMs:

  • AIM #1: Increase the number of deceased donor kidneys transplanted
  • AIM #2: Decrease the current national discard rate of all procured kidneys
  • AIM #3: Increase the percentage of change for kidneys recovered for transplant in the 60-85 Kidney Donor Profile Index score group

The ETCLC brings the potential for collaboration, communication and innovation across geography into reality. By participating in the ETCLC, Children’s National will benefit by:

  • the creation of efficiencies and reduction of duplicative efforts in kidney patient care
  • exposure to new, innovative ideas regarding the kidney transplant process
  • the enhancement of communication and relationship building within the kidney care community
  • the application of substantive changes to improve the donation and transplantation system
Nephrology at Children's National

2020 at a glance: Nephrology at Children’s National

The Children’s National Division of Nephrology is consistently recognized by U.S. News & World Report as one of the top programs in the nation.

Kidney transplants at Children's National

2019 at a glance: Nephrology at Children’s National

Nephrology at Children's National
Nephrology Infographic

Facts about Children’s National Kidney Transplant Program

The Children’s National Kidney Transplantation Program is the only one of its kind in the Washington, D.C., area focused on the needs of children and teens with kidney disease. With expert, multi-disciplinary approach to care, and larger transplant volumes, Children’s National can accept more at-risk transplants resulting in shorter wait times and maintaining excellent outcomes for our patients.
Asha Moudgil examines a young patient

Preventing cardiovascular disease after pediatric kidney transplant

Asha Moudgil examines a young patient

Pediatric nephrologist Asha Moudgil, M.D. examines a kidney transplant patient.

As obesity has continued to rise among children in the U.S., so has a condition called metabolic syndrome – a constellation of factors, including high abdominal fat, insulin resistance, high blood pressure, high triglycerides and low amounts of high-density lipoprotein (“good” cholesterol), that increase future risk of cardiovascular disease.

Although metabolic syndrome is dangerous in otherwise healthy children, it’s particularly so for those who’ve received kidney transplants due to chronic kidney disease, says pediatric nephrologist Asha Moudgil, M.D., medical director of transplant at Children’s National Health System. Dr. Moudgil and Children’s National co-authors, Registered Dietitian Kristen Sgambat, Ph.D., RD, and Cardiologist Sarah Clauss, M.D., published a literature review in the February 2018 Clinical Kidney Journal outlining recent research about the cardiovascular effects of metabolic syndrome after kidney transplantation.

“Simply having this transplant multiplies the risk of cardiovascular disease in this vulnerable population,” Dr. Moudgil says. “Combined with lifestyle factors that are driving up metabolic syndrome in general, it’s a ‘one-two punch’ for these patients.”

Dr. Moudgil explains that chronic kidney disease itself leads to poor growth, resulting in shorter stature that’s a risk factor for developing increased waist-to-height ratio upon becoming overweight. When children with this condition undergo long-awaited transplants, it reverses some factors that were suppressing appetite and keeping weight in check: The chronically high levels of urea in their blood decrease after transplant, improving their appetites; and there’s no need to maintain the restrictive diets they had been required to follow for kidney health prior to transplant.

The pharmaceutical regimen that patients follow post-transplant often includes steroids that independently contribute to weight gain and insulin resistance. Combined with the typical American high-fat, high-sugar, and high-sodium diet and low levels of physical activity, the majority of patients with chronic kidney disease gain significant weight after they receive transplants. The prevalence of obesity doubles the first year after transplantation, from about 15 percent to 30 percent, not only driving up cardiovascular disease risk but endangering the longevity of their transplant.

At the same time, says Sgambat, risk factors before and after transplantation drive up prevalence of other parts of metabolic syndrome. These include hypertension, which affects the majority of patients with chronic kidney disease before transplant and typically worsens due to sodium and water retention from immunosuppressive drugs. Dyslipidemia, or abnormal lipid concentrations in the blood, is also common among pediatric kidney transplant patients. One study included in the review showed that 71 percent of patients had high triglycerides three months post-transplant.

Ethnicity also can drive up risk for metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease. For example, the literature review says, individuals of African descent have a higher risk of these two conditions potentially due to genetic factors, such as high risk apolipoprotein L1 gene variants.

Together, these factors spur production of inflammatory molecules that trigger the development of early cardiovascular disease. Many kidney transplant recipients die from cardiovascular complications in early adulthood, Sgambat says, driving the need for early detection.

To that end, Dr. Moudgil says pediatric patients don’t typically show overt abnormalities in standard measures of cardiac functioning, such as echocardiography. As an alternative, she and colleagues cover three tools in the literature review that could offer advanced insight into whether patients have initial signs of cardiovascular disease. One of these is carotid intima-media thickness, a measure of the thickness of the carotid artery that can be obtained noninvasively by ultrasound. Another is myocardial strain imaging by speckle tracking echocardiography, a global measure of how the heart changes shape while beating. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), a relatively new technique, is already showing promise in detecting signs of early cardiovascular dysfunction.

A far simpler way to gauge cardiovascular risk, Sgambat adds, is calculating patients’ waist-to-height ratio. This measure doesn’t require sophisticated tools and can be tracked in any clinic over time, alerting patients to health-altering changes before it’s too late.

“It’s even more important to treat cardiovascular risk factors aggressively in this population,” Sgambat says. “Getting a concrete measure that something is trending in the wrong direction may motivate patients to change their diet or lifestyle in ways that a simple recommendation may not.”

little girl in hosptial corridor

A growing list of factors that impact CKD severity for kids

little girl in hosptial corridor

Myriad biological and societal factors can impact the occurrence and accelerate progression of chronic kidney disease for children of African descent – including preterm birth, exposure to toxins during gestation and lower socioeconomic status – and can complicate these children’s access to effective treatments.

Myriad biological and societal factors can impact the occurrence and accelerate progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD) for children of African descent – including preterm birth, exposure to toxins during gestation and lower socioeconomic status – and can complicate these children’s access to effective treatments, according to an invited commentary published in the November 2018 edition of American Journal of Kidney Diseases.

Clinicians caring for “these vulnerable children should be mindful of these multiple competing and compounding issues as treatment options are being considered along the continuum from CKD to kidney failure to transplantation,” writes Marva Moxey-Mims, M.D., chief of the Division of Nephrology at Children’s National Health System.

The supplemental article was informed by lessons learned from The Chronic Kidney Disease in Children (CKiD) longitudinal study and conversations that occurred during the Frank M. Norfleet Forum for Advancement of Health, “African Americans and Kidney Disease in the 21st Century.”

African American children represent 23 percent of the overall population of kids with CKD in the CKiD study. While acquired kidney diseases can get their start during childhood when the diseases betray few symptoms, the full impact of illness may not be felt until adulthood. A number of factors can uniquely affect children of African descent, heightening risk for some kids who already are predisposed to suffering more severe symptoms. These include:

  • Preterm birth. African American children make up 36 percent of patients in CKiD with glomerular disease, which tends to have faster progression to end-stage renal disease. These diseases impair kidney function by weakening glomeruli, which impairs the kidneys’ ability to clean blood. Patients with a high-risk apolipoprotein L1 (APOL1) genotype already are at higher risk for focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) and CKD. Researchers hypothesize that preterm birth may represent “a second hit that facilitates the development of glomerular damage resulting from the high-risk genotype.” According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 1 in 10 U.S. infants in 2016 was born preterm, e.g., prior to 37 weeks gestation.
  • APOL1 genotype. Compared with children who had a low-risk genotype and FSGS, children with a high-risk genotype had higher rates of uncontrolled hypertension, left ventricular hypertrophy, elevated C-reactive protein levels and obesity.
  • Human immunodeficiency viral (HIV) status. About 65 percent of U.S. children with HIV-1/AIDS are African American. In a recent nested case-control study of children infected with HIV in the womb, infants with high-risk APOL1 genotypes were 3.5 times more likely to develop CKD with viral infection serving as “a likely second hit.”
  • Access to kidney transplant. African American adults experience a faster transition to end-stage renal disease and are less likely to receive kidney transplants. African American children with CKD from nonglomerular diseases begin renal replacement therapy 1.6 years earlier than children of other races, after adjusting for socioeconomic status. Their wait for dialysis therapy was 37.5 percent shorter. However, these African American children waited 53.7 percent longer for transplants. Although donor blood types, genetic characteristics and other biological factors each play contributing roles, “these findings may reflect sociocultural and institutional differences not captured by socioeconomic status,” Dr. Moxey-Mims writes.

To alleviate future health care disparities, she suggests that additional research explore the impact of expanding services to pregnant women to lower their chances of giving birth prematurely; early childhood interventions to help boost children’s educational outcomes, future job prospects and income levels; expanded studies about the impact of environmental toxicities on prenatal and postnatal development; and heightened surveillance of preterm infants as they grow older to spot signs of kidney disease earlier to slow or prevent disease progression.

“Clinicians can now begin to take into account genetics, socioeconomic status and the impact of the built environment, rather than blaming people and assuming that their behavior alone brought on kidney disease,” Dr. Moxey-Mims adds. “Smoking, not eating properly and not exercising can certainly make people vulnerable to disease. However, there are so many factors that go into developing a disease that patients cannot control: You don’t control to whom you’re born, where you live or available resources where you live. These research projects will be useful to help us really get to the bottom of which factors we can impact and which things can’t we prevent but can strive to mitigate.”

The article covered in this post is part of a supplement that arose from the Frank M. Norfleet Forum for Advancement of Health: African Americans and Kidney Disease in the 21st Century, held March 24, 2017, in Memphis, Tennessee. The Forum and the publication of this supplement were funded by the Frank M. Norfleet Forum for Advancement of Health, the Community Foundation of Greater Memphis and the University of Tennessee Health Science Center.

child in wheelchair with mom

Potential to replace race as a risk factor for kidney-transplant failure

child in wheelchair with mom

Right now, more than 100,000 adult and pediatric patients in the U.S. are waiting for a life-saving kidney donation. Thirteen of them die each day while awaiting a transplant. However, a significant portion of kidneys from deceased donors are discarded because they literally don’t make the grade – a scoring system known as the kidney donor profile index (KDPI) that aims to predict how long a donor kidney will last in an intended recipient based on a variety of factors, including the donor’s age, size and health history.

Ethnicity and race are also part of that scoring system, explains Marva Moxey-Mims, M.D., FASN, chief of the Division of Nephrology at Children’s National Health System. That’s partly because research over the years has suggested that kidneys from certain racial groups, including African-Americans, may not have the same longevity as those from other groups.

But race might not be the right marker to consider, Dr. Moxey-Mims counters. More recent studies have shown that a particular gene known as APOL1 might better predict risk of kidney-transplant failure. APOL1 high-risk variants are associated with a wide range of kidney diseases, with retrospective studies suggesting that they could be a key cause of failure in some donated kidneys. Although this gene is found almost exclusively in people of recent African descent, only about 13 percent of that population has high-risk APOL1 variants that might cause kidney problems.

“Instead of putting all African-American donor kidneys in one proverbial ‘bucket,’ we might be able to use this gene to determine if they truly carry a higher risk of early failure,” Dr. Moxey-Mims says.

To more definitively confirm whether this gene could be used as a proxy for heightened kidney-failure risk, Dr. Moxey-Mims and colleagues across the country are participating in the APOL1 Long-Term Kidney Transplantation Outcomes Network (APOLLO) study, she and Dr. Barry Freedman explain in a perspective published online April 27, 2018, in Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. The APOLLO study will tap people accessing the hundreds of transplant centers scattered across the nation, prospectively genotyping deceased and living African-American kidney donors as well as kidney-transplant recipients to assess whether they carry high-risk APOL1 gene variants. Living donors and transplant recipients will be followed for years to gauge how their kidneys fare over time.

The researchers, Dr. Moxey-Mims explains, hope to answer whether the APOL1 high-risk gene variants in donor kidneys could replace race as a risk factor when calculating the KDPI score and whether recipients’ own APOL1 gene variants impact transplant failure risk. They also hope to better understand the risk to living donors. “If a living donor has an increased risk of kidney failure,” she adds, “he or she can make a more educated decision about whether to donate a kidney.”

Dr. Moxey-Mims plays a pivotal role as the chair of the study’s steering committee, a group made up of the study’s principal investigators at all 13 clinical sites and the Data Coordinating Center, as well as the program officials from the National Institutes of Health funding institutes (National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases, National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, and National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities). She will play a key part in helping to ensure that the study stays on track with recruitment goals, as well as publicizing the study at national meetings.

The study also includes a Community Advisory Council, a group made up of stakeholders in this study: 26 African-Americans who either have donated a kidney, received a kidney donation, are on dialysis awaiting a kidney transplant, or have a close relative in one of those categories. This group has helped to steer the study design in multiple ways, Dr. Moxey-Mims explains. For example, they have worked with study leaders to simplify the language on consent forms, helped to delineate which data study participants might want to receive when the study is completed, and helped to publicize the study in their communities by giving talks at churches and other venues.

Eventually, Dr. Moxey-Mims says APOLLO study researchers hope that clarifying the role of the APOL1 gene in kidney-transplant failure could lead to fewer discarded kidneys, which could boost the number of available kidneys for patients awaiting transplants.

“Down the road, the pool of patients awaiting transplant might have access to more kidneys because available organs aren’t getting a bad score simply because the donor is African-American,” she says. “We hope this might shorten the wait for some patients and their families who are desperate to get that call that a kidney is finally available.”

Financial support for research reported in the post was provided by the National Institutes of Health under grant numbers R01 DK084149, R01 DK070941 and U01 DK116041.

antibodies-illustration

Detecting and treating dnDSA early preserves allograft function

antibodies-illustration

Monitoring and treating de novo donor-specific antibodies (dnDSA) before they could cause graft damage helped to decrease dnDSA in a majority of pediatric kidney transplant recipients at Children National Health System and prevented graft failure in the first few years.

Development of de novo donor-specific antibodies (dnDSA) is known to cause graft failure. Therefore, a protocol aimed at prospective monitoring and treating dnDSA – before they can cause graft damage – was developed for kidney transplant recipients at Children National Health System. This helped to decrease dnDSA in 76 percent of pediatric patients and prevented graft failure in the first few years, indicates a longitudinal cohort study published online Jan. 22, 2018, in Pediatric Transplantation. However, the benefit of preserving function of transplanted kidneys came at a price: Heightened hospitalization rates for infection.

An estimated 20 percent to 30 percent of children develop dnDSA and many of these patients go on to develop allograft failure after three to six years, write the study authors.

Clinical signs of graft failure due to antibodies appear too late to safeguard long-term graft survival. According to the study authors, developing earlier methods to detect dnDSA offers the opportunity to intervene before irreversible graft injury occurs.

“Children’s National Health System instituted a routine protocol that standardizes monitoring and treatment of dnDSA,” says Asha Moudgil, M.D., FASN, associate chief of the Division of Nephrology at Children’s National and the study’s senior author. “We followed this protocol as we monitored and treated all children younger than 19 who received a kidney transplant at Children’s National from Jan. 1, 2008, to Dec. 31, 2013.”

After transplant, these children were monitored for development of dnDSA at six months and then yearly. Upon detection of DSA, these children underwent kidney biopsy to assess for acute rejection. Additionally, monitoring was intensified to every two months.

“Our patients did not have a statistically significant increase in graft loss or dysfunction, suggesting that early and targeted treatment of dnDSA may benefit patients,” says Asha Moudgil, M.D., FASN.

Sixty-seven of the 72 children who received kidney transplants during that six-year period were included in this retrospective analysis. Their mean age was 14.1 years. Acute cellular rejection was treated according to a prespecified protocol.

  • The team treated de novo DSA with high-dose intravenous immunoglobulin (IVIG) if antibody titers were low and added two doses of rituximab to that treatment regimen if antibody titers were high.
  • If either C1q binding of immunodominant DSA was present or C4d+ were seen on biopsy, six sessions of plasma exchange were added to the above protocol.
  • Kids who were resistant to such treatment approaches received an additional four doses of IVIG monthly.

Nearly 39 percent of the children developed dnDSA within a median of 1.36 years. Ten of these 26 children had increased creatinine, 12 had new onset proteinuria and six had newly diagnosed hypertension at the time the dnDSA was detected. The multivariate analysis found that the coefficient of variance of tacrolimus, which measures adherence to immunosuppressive drugs, was the only statistically significant predictor for developing dnDSA.

DSA-positive patients had a higher rate of admissions (1.23 hospital admissions for infectious- or immunosuppressive-related side effects per patient, compared with 0.59 hospital admissions for the DSA-negative patients), which the study team attributes to aggressive treatment of dnDSA.

“Our patients did not have a statistically significant increase in graft loss or dysfunction, suggesting that early and targeted treatment of dnDSA may benefit patients,” Dr. Moudgil adds. “There was a higher risk of treatment-related complications, however, and this risk must be balanced against the short-term benefit of prolonging allograft function.”

Study co-authors include Olga Charnaya, M.D., a Children’s fellow when the study was designed and the article was drafted, now at Johns Hopkins; and Children’s Nephrologist, Shamir Tuchman, M.D.

Zhe Han

Fruit flies can model human genetic kidney disease

Zhe Han

Zhe Han, Ph.D., has found that a majority of human genes known to be associated with nephrotic syndrome play conserved roles in renal function, from fruit flies to humans.

Drosophila melanogaster, the common fruit fly, has played a key role in genetic research for decades. Even though D. melanogaster and humans look vastly different, researchers estimate that about 75 percent of human disease-causing genes have a functional homolog in the fly.

A Children’s National Health System research team reported in a recent issue of Human Molecular Genetics that the majority of genes associated with nephrotic syndrome (NS) in humans also play pivotal roles in Drosophila renal function, a conservation of function across species that validates transgenic flies as ideal pre-clinical models to improve understanding of human disease.

NS is a cluster of symptoms that signal kidney damage, including excess protein in urine, low protein levels in blood, elevated cholesterol and swelling. Research teams have identified mutations in more than 40 genes that cause genetic kidney disease, but knowledge gaps remain in understanding the precise roles that specific genes play in kidney cell biology and renal disease. To address those research gaps, Zhe Han, Ph.D., a principal investigator and associate professor in the Center for Cancer & Immunology Research at Children’s National, and colleagues systematically studied NS-associated genes in the Drosophila model, including seven genes whose renal function had never been analyzed in a pre-clinical model.

“Eighty-five percent of these genes are required for nephrocyte function, suggesting that a majority of human genes known to be associated with NS play conserved roles in renal function from flies to humans,” says Han, the paper’s senior author. “To hone in on functional conservation, we focused on Cindr, the fly’s version of the human NS gene, CD2AP,” Han adds. “Silencing Cindr in nephrocytes led to dramatic impairments in nephrocyte function, shortened their life span, collapsed nephrocyte lacunar channels – the fly’s nutrient circulatory system – and effaced nephrocyte slit diaphragms, which diminished filtration function.”

And, to confirm that the phenotypes they were studying truly caused human disease, they reversed the damage by expressing a wild-type human CD2AP gene. A mutant allele derived from a patient with CD2AP-associated NS did not rescue the phenotypes.

Thus, the Drosophila nephrocyte can be used to explain the clinically relevant molecular mechanisms underlying the pathogenesis of most monogenic forms of NS, the research team concludes. “This is a landmark paper for using the fly to study genetic kidney diseases,” Han adds. “For the first time, we realized that the functions of essential kidney genes could be so similar from the flies to humans.”

A logical next step will be to generate personalized in vivo models of genetic renal diseases bearing patient-specific mutations, Han says. These in vivo models can be used for drug screens to identify treatments for kidney diseases that currently lack therapeutic options, such as most of the 40 genes studies in this paper as well as the APOL1 gene that is associated with the higher risk of kidney diseases among millions of African Americans.