Since the retraction of the COOPERATE trial by the Lancet late last year (following Regina Kunz’s famous ‘letter of concern’), combination RAAS blockade has suffered something of a fall from grace. This was dealt a second blow by…
This is the story of a 64 year old male mason with past medical history notable for hypertension and hyperlipidemia who was referred to me for evaluation of proteinuria. The patient noted onset of lower extremity edema nine…
At Renal Grand Rounds yesterday, we discussed the case of a previously healthy 50 year old man who presented with fulminant hepatic failure and AKI. He was initially thought to have AKI related to either SIRS/hypotension or Hepatorenal…
Nate Hellman’s bench was three benches down from my lab. Nate and I trained together as clinical fellows. He and I had also brainstormed on research projects involving TRP channels and kidney disease. TRP channels are my research…
Just heard an interesting talk on endothelial dysfunction and its relation to nephrology. One thing I learned is that the vascular endothelium is actually “hairy”, as demonstrated from this electron micrograph (taken from this website). These little hairs…
Peter Mundel, a well-known researcher of podocyte biology, gave our Renal Grand Rounds today. Here’s what I took away from this morning’s talk: -regulation of the podocyte’s actin cytoskeleton is postulated to be the final common pathway in…
Take-home points from Mayo Clinic’s Fernando Fervenza’s excellent Renal Grand Rounds this morning, in which he addresses the potential use of rituximab as a treatment for membranous nephropathy: -the “rule of thirds” that we learn about membranous nephropathy (e.g.,…
Interferons are cytokines which play a central role in the inflammatory response, and commercially prepared interferons have proven useful in the treatment of several diseases. For instance, interferon-alpha (often used in conjunction with ribavirin) is often used in…
As acute rejection rates continue to fall, causes of late allograft loss, such as transplant glomerulopathy (TG), become increasingly important. TG should spring to mind when you encounter a renal transplant recipient who develops heavy proteinuria and progressive…
A very interesting article in this month’s JASN by Herlitz et al describes a cohort of 10 bodybuilders with chronic kidney disease, making a compelling case that anabolic steroid use is an underrecognized cause of secondary FSGS. The…
