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 Dear
Colleagues,The new format for Renal Express maintains the best aspects of ASN’s electronic newsletter and incorporates the content of the Renal Policy Express, which will be discontinued. In addition to updates about policy, the new Renal Express also includes features about interesting issues, interviews with ASN members, reports about the Society’s committees and advisory groups, and selections from ASN peer-reviewed journals. Beginning in April, ASN members can expect to receive Renal Express twice a month. Recently, ASN launched a revamped website. The new site has improved navigation, enhanced visual appeal, and a platform for providing new member services. During the rest of 2008, the Society plans to take advantage of this platform and expand web-based services to ASN members. For example, the homepage now includes two scrolling feeds that provide the latest news about renal-related issues. To help the Society’s members stay informed, ASN last week launched Kidney Daily. A customized briefing of the latest news from journals, newspapers, and other sources, Kidney Daily gives ASN members access to essential news. ASN created Kidney Daily in partnership with US News Custom Briefings. Finally, I wish to use this opportunity to remind you:
Thank you for your ongoing support of ASN. Sincerely,  Peter S. Aronson, MD, FASN President American Society of Nephrology |
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ASN to Congress: Kidney Disease
Is ‘Common, Harmful, and Treatable’ The ASN Public Policy Board commemorated the third
annual World Kidney Day Thursday, March 13, 2008, with advocacy efforts
on Capitol Hill. Nearly 20 nephrologists came to Washington, DC, to
visit approximately 60 congressional offices and hold meetings with
members of Congress and their staff from 15 states. On many visits, ASN
members were paired with patient advocates from the National Kidney
Foundation (NKF).Between the two organizations, meetings were held with a total of 96 congressional offices representing 26 different states. The advocacy efforts were preceded by a congressional reception where the featured speaker was Randy Thomas, the right guard for the Washington Redskins. Attendees also included Representative Mark S. Kirk (R-IL), Jonathan Himmelfarb, MD, Chair of ASN’s Public Policy Board, NKF President Allan J. Collins, MD, Representative Shelley Berkley (D-NV), and ASN President Peter Aronson, MD (pictured). ASN President Peter S. Aronson, MD, also recorded an audio news release that was distributed nationally, while the other visiting ASN members conducted radio interviews to help increase awareness of chronic kidney disease (CKD) as a growing public health problem. Initial results indicate that the audio news release and radio media tour combined have reached nearly 23 million people nationwide. Download Dr. Aronson's recorded message. World Kidney Day 2008 was celebrated in 88 countries and territories and on six continents. A joint initiative of the International Society of Nephrology (ISN) and the International Federation of Kidney Foundations (IFKF), World Kidney Day is held annually on the second Thursday of March. The main message of World Kidney Day is that kidney disease is “common, harmful, and treatable.” In partnership with NKF, the American Society for Pediatric Nephrology, and the Renal Physicians Association, ASN’s message on Capitol Hill included requests for increased funding for the National Institutes of Health, Medicare coverage for advanced (stage 4-5) chronic kidney disease, and more support for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention CKD Program. To date, ASN’s efforts to commemorate World Kidney Day 2008 is the largest advocacy initiative put forth by the Society. Based on the early results from Members of Congress, their staff, and the media, ASN’s message was well received. During the next month, the ASN Public Policy Board will follow up with the congressional offices. This effort will include providing information about legislation that ASN supports, suggested language on kidney disease for pending legislation, and assistance in joining the Congressional Kidney Caucus. To learn more about World Kidney Day, ASN’s recent efforts, or the Public Policy Board, please contact ASN Senior Policy Coordinator Susan Owens at sowens@asn-online.org. |
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 Origins of Renal Physiology "I've been teaching on the wards for a long time," says Mark L. Zeidel, MD, Chair of the Department of Medicine at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC). "I teach renal physiology and pathophysiology to medical students, and I've attended on the wards at Pittsburgh, PA, and here in Boston. And, anytime I start talking about mechanisms of disease and how things actually work, about the older experimental models people once used, the physicians-in-training become fascinated." This favorable response to his insights led Dr. Zeidel to realize that the current fellows and junior faculty at his institution lacked much of the knowledge he gained by the now unique research experiences in which he participated as a young trainee. Emboldened by a desire to provide younger generations of nephrologists with the same compelling experience that helped him understand the physiological underpinnings of nephrology's history of investigation, Dr. Zeidel and his fellow course directors decided to create a national course for renal fellows that would inject the excitement of mechanism and inquiry into the teaching of renal physiology and pathophysiology. Beginning Sunday, September 14, 2008, the National Course for Renal Fellows: The Origins of Renal Physiology will become an annual event at the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratories in Bar Harbor, ME. "As undergraduates, many fellows go into a laboratory and spend the whole summer trying to figure out how to get a measurement to work," notes Dr. Zeidel. "When they finally figure it out and start to do the fun part, the summer is over." That won't be the case for the National Course for Renal Fellows: The Origins of Renal Physiology. For 30 nephrology fellows drawn from programs across the country—and, hopefully, the world—Dr. Zeidel, Joseph A. Bonventre, MD, PhD, Vikas Sukhatme, MD, and John Forrest, MD, will direct a course that provides immediate immersion, allowing the fellows to perform experiments that generate data, which will help them focus on data analysis instead of data acquisition. Working directly with faculty in the laboratory to analyze the data, the fellows will have the opportunity to present their work and its rationale to each other in a setting that encourages peer review, discussion, and insights about the implications of their results. Dr. Zeidel believes that being able to think about mechanisms of disease is a necessary component in a nephrologist's education. "It makes you a better doctor if you are capable of understanding research and how it's done, even if you are taking care of patients all day instead of conducting research." He also believes that "studies now are much more molecular. People are often doing epidemiological studies of outcomes, studying populations of thousands of dialysis patients, or looking at one specific molecule, and they don't have a clue how it all fits together and how the physiology actually works." According to Dr. Zeidel, when he brought "medical students to Mount Desert Island for courses in the past and shown them a toad bladder and how to treat it with ADH, how the water suddenly moves through it, the students get it for the first time in a way they never have before." The origins of this course began years ago when Dr. Zeidel was conducting research on fish biology during a summer at Mount Desert Island. At the time, the Yale School of Medicine held an annual course for its students that proved tremendously successful. Dr. Zeidel—on behalf of the Dean of the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine—volunteered to direct a similar course at the laboratory. The next year, he brought a group of medical students from Pittsburgh to Mount Desert Island and ran a course similar to the Yale program, and it was exceptionally successful. In fact, both groups of medical students reported to the deans that the course had not only excited them about research, but that it was the best and most important experience of their first year of medical school. These results inspired the educational leaders at Pittsburgh to begin to consider a new approach. Eventually, a course plan developed that was similar in logistics and timing to the medical student course "but with much more of a focus on renal physiology and an effort to revisit the models and experiments that once lead the renal field," Dr. Zeidel explains. Selecting the location for the National Course for Renal Fellows: The Origins of Renal Physiology was an easy decision for Dr. Zeidel and his colleagues. The Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratories are well run, located next to one of the most visited national parks in the United States, and offer incredible opportunities for recreation and interactions among fellows and faculty. In addition, the laboratories are home to many of the major discoveries in the early history of renal physiology. While the course is currently weighted toward transport physiology, Dr. Zeidel sees the program expanding in the future with a consistent interchange of modules, invitations to build new modules, and a vigorous rotation of senior investigators from across the country to teach the course. He also sees management of the course changing, but ultimately aims for the course to be a permanent part of fellowship training in the United States, which currently accommodates 10% of the county"s fellows in nephrology every year with the potential to accommodate twice that amount. In addition to creating a course that can lead to recruitment of stronger physician-scientist candidates to nephrology as well as provide a solid grounding in renal physiology and history that enhances the perspective of renal investigators, Dr. Zeidel also sees other downstream benefits of the course. "What I hope will happen is that a number of the fellows will go into research; but, whatever career the fellows choose, they will encounter people in their professional lives who went to Mount Desert Island, and our field will become more collegial that way. They will serve on study sections together, talk to each other about teaching and caring for patients. The course will make for more cohesion in our field and develop a community of scholarship at a personal level that is so crucial to the success of the scholarly efforts in nephrology." ASN encourages Fellowship Training Directors to nominate and sponsor one or more first- or second-year fellows whose career goals and trajectory are aligned with this course. Please sign your candidate's application form (attestation statement) and provide your letter of support with his/her application packet. In the letter on behalf of the candidate, please describe why this course will be valuable to his/her career goals. In addition to the letter, the application must include the candidate"s curriculum vitae and a brief personal statement. The tuition for the National Course for Renal Fellows: The Origins of Renal Physiology is $3,000, which is provided by sponsoring fellowship program. The course includes all meals and room accommodations, but not travel. The deadline to apply for the course is Tuesday, April 15, 2008 For more information about the course—including the application - please visit http://www.mdibl.org/courses/renal08.shtml |
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Chronic Kidney Disease Advisory Group
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JASN March
Press ReleaseFor critically ill patients, intensive insulin therapy (IIT) to keep blood sugar (glucose) at normal levels reduces the risk of acute kidney injury. The new research builds on previous randomized trials, including more than 2,700 patients, which reached the "startling" conclusion that IIT reduces the risk of death in critically ill patients. March TOC; Link to JASN Study CJASN  March
Press ReleaseTwo studies suggest that universal access to health care might help to overcome racial and ethnic barriers to treatment for kidney disease. March TOC; Study 1; Study 2; Editorial NephSAP  HypertensionThe March 2008 edition of NephSAP deals with Hypertension, and includes an editorial by David A. Calhoun on “Aldosterone and Hypertension.” March TOC; Editorial |
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Call
for ASN Councilor Nominations
The deadline for ASN members to
send suggestions for candidates for the
2008 ASN Council election is Friday, April 4, 2008, at 4:00 p.m. EST. A
special effort is being made to diversify the composition of the
Council, so please consider suggesting individuals who will help the
ASN accomplish this goal. ASN members are encouraged to send
suggestions to Sr. Project Manager for Administration Neysa Matthews at
nmatthews@asn-online.org |
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In an effort to diagnose patients with CKD
sooner and thereby slow the progression of their disease, the CKD
Advisory Group developed a letter that urges nephrologists to help
facilitate the reporting of estimated glomerular filtration rates
(eGFR) by all hospital and commercial clinical laboratories in the
United States. This letter has been endorsed by other organizations
such as the American Association of Clinical Chemistry, the American
Diabetes Association, the College of American Pathologists, and the
National Kidney Disease Education Program. Please 
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