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Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Cost of Health Care, Diabetes, JAMA / 02.10.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Andrew Sumarsono, MD UT Southwestern Medical Center MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?   Response: There are currently 12 types of medications used to treat type 2 diabetes. With approximately 30 million adults living with diabetes in the United States, the rising cost of insulin has raised concerns about the affordability of diabetes care. We evaluated trends in total spending and number of prescriptions of all diabetes therapies among Medicare Part D beneficiaries between 2012 and 2017. (more…)
Author Interviews, Infections, JAMA, OBGYNE, USPSTF / 01.10.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Melissa A. Simon, M.D., M.P.H. Member, U.S. Preventive Services Task Force George H. Gardner professor of clinical gynecology, Vice chair of clinical research Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology Professor of preventive medicine and medical social sciences Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Asymptomatic bacteriuria, or ASB, is when someone has bacteria in their urine but does not have any signs or symptoms of a urinary tract infection. For pregnant people, this can be a major health concern resulting in severe, even life-threatening, infections that can lead to serious harms for both the mother and the baby. The Task Force’s primary finding in updating its recommendation on this topic was that screening for ASB continues to be beneficial in preventing complications and preserving the health of mothers and their babies during pregnancy.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Genetic Research, JAMA, Mental Health Research / 30.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr Sophie Legge Research Associate MRC Centre for Neuropsychiatric Genetics and Genomics Division of Psychological Medicine and Clinical Neurosciences Cardiff University Cardiff MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Psychotic experiences, such as hallucinations and delusions, are features of mental health disorders, such as schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, but they are also reported by approximately 5%-10% of the general population. Psychotic experiences are only considered to be symptoms of mental illness if there are other symptoms of that disorder. It is currently unclear what the genetic causes of psychotic experiences in the general population are, and whether these causes are related to the genetic causes of schizophrenia and other mental health disorders. Given that psychotic experiences are one of the key symptoms of schizophrenia, they may be more closely related than with other mental health conditions such as depression. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Lung Cancer, Vaccine Studies / 28.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Naomi E Aronson, MD, FIDA, FACP Professor and Director, Infectious Diseases Division Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences Bethesda, MD  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: BCG is a live attenuated mycobacteria vaccine used to prevent tuberculosis which has been reported to have associated nonspecific effects such as treatment of diabetes, bladder cancer, prevention of severe respiratory infections in children, and suppressed autoimmune responses. In earlier reports in the 1970s, results of epidemiologic studies were divided as to whether BCG vaccine was associated with subsequent rates of malignancy, specifically leukemia (protective) and non Hodgkins lymphoma (higher rates). To further evaluate these observations we studied cancer data collected in the 60 year follow up of a controlled trial of BCG in American Indian/ Alaska Native schoolchildren. (more…)
ADHD, Author Interviews, Depression, Education, JAMA, Mental Health Research, Pediatrics / 25.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jeremy Brown BA MSc RESEARCH DEGREE STUDENT IN PHARMACOEPIDEMIOLOGY London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Given the way schools typically work, children in the same year as each other can be almost a whole year apart in terms of age. We’ve known for a while that children who are young in their year at school are also more likely to be diagnosed as having hyperactivity disorders and tend to do less well academically than the older children in the year. They also seem to be at increased risk of suicide. This is thankfully an extremely rare occurrence in children, but there is little evidence about whether younger children are more likely to be diagnosed with depression. We used electronic health records for just over a million children in the UK to see if there was any association between how old the children were in their year and whether they got diagnosed with ADHD, intellectual disability and depression. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, Diabetes, Diabetes Care, JAMA / 23.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rebecca Myerson, PhD Assistant Professor, Population Health Sciences School of Medicine and Public Health University of Wisconsin, Madison MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Many people with diabetes are undiagnosed, and those who are diagnosed often are untreated and uncontrolled. Increasing access to health insurance for patients with health care needs was a goal of the Affordable Care Act. We analyzed information from 11 years of the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey, which gathers data that are nationally representative of the civilian population. The biennial survey includes biomarkers, including HbA1c, a measure of blood-sugar control. Using the NHANES data allowed the researchers to identify those with undiagnosed diabetes. (more…)
Author Interviews, CT Scanning, JAMA, Lung Cancer, UCSF / 23.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Joshua Demb, PhD, MPH Postdoctoral Scholar, Moores Cancer Center University of California, San Diego Health Science Research Specialist Veterans Affairs San Diego Healthcare System MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Our study leveraged radiation dose data from 72 facilities performing CT scans around the United States to learn more about the radiation dose used for lung cancer screening scans, as well as possible institutional predictors that might be associated with higher dose.  Currently, the American College of Radiology has recommendations for how these low-dose lung cancer screening scans should be performed. However, it is unclear how much adherence there currently is to these guidelines. Our findings indicated that there is wide variation in the distribution of radiation doses for low-dose lung cancer screening scans both within- and between facilities in our sample—in some cases this variation led to doses higher than the ACR recommendations.   (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, University of Pittsburgh / 23.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Coleman Drake, PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Health Policy and Management Affiliate faculty member Center for Pharmaceutical Policy and Prescribing University of Pittsburgh MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Every year, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services puts out of notice of proposed changes to the rules governing the Health Insurance Marketplaces created by the Affordable Care Act (e.g., healthcare.gov). The most recent notice for 2020 (issued in 2019) considered eliminating automatic reenrollment for Marketplace enrollees. On the one hand, requiring that enrollees actively select a health plan to stay insured is a good thing because it forces them to consider their options – we know that people make better health plan choices when they consider their choices. On the other hand, creating an administrative barrier to staying insured could cause some people to become uninsured. Since 3.4 million Marketplace enrollees used automatic enrollment in 2019, eliminating it might cause a spike in the uninsured rate. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Smoking, Tobacco, Tobacco Research / 22.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Hongying (Daisy) Dai, PhD Associate Professor Department of Biostatistics | College of Public Health University of Nebraska Medical Center Omaha MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Previous studies have reported a surge in e-cigarette use among youth during the 2017 - 2018. For instance, the prevalence of current (past 30-day) e-cigarette use increased by 77.8% (from 11.7% to 20.8%) among high school students and by 48.5% (from 3.3% to 4.9%) among middle school students. As a result, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warns that youth e-cigarette use is reaching an epidemic proportion in September 2018. Whether e-cigarette use prevalence also increased among young adults (aged 18-24 years), a population with high e-cigarette use rates and vulnerability to nicotine dependence, is unknown. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, End of Life Care, JAMA / 19.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Donald Sullivan, MD, MA, MCR Associate Professor of Medicine & Associate Fellowship Program Director Division of Pulmonary & Critical Care Medicine Oregon Health & Science University Investigator, Center to Improve Veteran Involvement in Care (CIVIC) VA-Portland Health Care System  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study?
  • Patients with lung cancer suffer from considerable physical and psychological symptom burden and palliative care is underutilized or delivered too close to death to provide meaningful benefits for these patients. Palliative care is associated with improved quality of life for these patients, but the findings regarding a survival benefit are not clear.
  • Palliative care is distinct from hospice. Palliative care is meant to be delivered along with disease-modifying therapy and focuses on improving quality of life by addressing pain and other problems, including physical, psychosocial and spiritual for patients and their families. Hospice care is focused on reducing suffering, pain and anxiety at the very end of life; typically within a few months of death.
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Author Interviews, Electronic Records, Emergency Care, JAMA / 19.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Carl Berdahl, MD, MS Emergency Physician and Health Services Researcher CEDARS-SINAI West Hollywood CA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The length of a doctor’s note is taken account when determining how much a doctor or medical center is paid for a visit. However, in the digital era, a doctor can generate large amounts of text with just a few keystrokes. Given this incentive structure, we were concerned doctors’ notes might be inaccurate in certain sections of the chart that are important for billing. We used observers to determine how accurately doctors’ notes reflected the interactions between patients and physicians. (more…)
Author Interviews, Health Care Systems, JAMA, Primary Care / 18.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Deborah Korenstein, MD FACP General internist and Chief, General Internal Medicine Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Executive physicals are 1 to 2-day comprehensive health assessments offering disease screening and preventive testing. Large companies can arrange for these evaluations for senior executives. They are often offered by prestigious academic medical centers, but can also be located in less formal settings like spas. They generally include a set of tests that sometimes vary based on patient characteristics. Any tests that are done in response to from findings from executive physicals are billed to health insurance companies. A single 2008 paper described executive physicals and criticized them for being non-evidence based. Since then, executive physicals have grown in popularity, but their nature and impact have not been described. We set out to describe included services and cost of executive physicals at top academic medical centers. (more…)
Author Interviews, Environmental Risks, JAMA, Smoking / 17.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Sairam Jabba, Ph.D Senior Research Associate Department of Anesthesiology Duke University Durham, NC 27710 MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Pulegone is a potential carcinogen contained in several mint oils. Due to its carcinogenic properties, FDA banned pulegone last year as a food additive. Previous chemical analytical studies from CDC have demonstrated that several mint/menthol-flavored e-cigarette liquids and snuff tobacco products contain pulegone in significant amounts. FDA currently does not regulate pulegone in e-cigarettes and snuff products and the health risk associated with it for the users is not well understood.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Critical Care - Intensive Care - ICUs, Genetic Research, Infections, JAMA / 17.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: QiPing Feng, PhD Division of Clinical Pharmacology Department of Medicine Vanderbilt University Medical Center Nashville, Tennessee MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Sepsis is one of the leading causes of hospital mortality. Yet, there are no specific effective treatments for it. Recent information suggests that drugs that inhibit proprotein convertase subtilisin kexin type 9 (PCSK9) could have potential as a new treatment for sepsis. We used a genetic approach to test if variation in PCSK9 affected the risk of sepsis. In patients admitted to hospital with infection, neither variants in the PCSK9 gene nor predicted expression of PCSK9 were associated with risk of sepsis or poorer outcomes after sepsis.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Breast Cancer, JAMA, USPSTF / 12.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Carol Mangione, M.D., M.S.P.H., F.A.C.P. Division Chief of General Internal Medicine and Health Services Research Professor of Medicine Barbara A. Levey, MD, and Gerald S. Levey, MD, endowed chair in Medicine David Geffen School of Medicine University of California Los Angeles Professor of public health at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We all want to find better ways to help prevent breast cancer, a disease that impacts the lives of too many women in the United States each year. Fortunately, the Task Force found there are steps that women at increased risk can take to reduce their chances of developing breast cancer. (more…)
Author Interviews, Cancer Research, JAMA, MRI, Prostate Cancer, UCLA / 12.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rajiv Jayadevan, MD and  Leonard S. Marks, MD Department of Urology UCLA MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Men with low risk prostate cancer often enter “active surveillance” programs. These programs allow patients to defer definitive treatment (and avoid their associated side effects) until more aggressive disease is detected, if at all. Patients typically undergo a “confirmatory biopsy” 6 to 12 months after diagnosis to verify that their disease is low risk, and then undergo repeat biopsies every 1 to 2 years. These biopsies have traditionally been performed under the guidance of transrectal ultrasonography. Transrectal ultrasonography is unable to accurately visualize tumors within the prostate, necessitating that biopsy cores be obtained systematically from all parts of the prostate. MRI-ultrasonography fusion biopsy is a newer technology that has been shown to characterize biopsy findings more accurately than transrectal ultrasonography, leading to improved disease detection. This technology also allows us to visualize tumors within the prostate, and directly target these tumors during a biopsy session. (more…)
Author Interviews, Emory, Health Care Systems, JAMA, Kidney Disease, Transplantation / 11.09.2019

 A retraction and replacement have been issued due to a major coding error that resulted in the reporting of incorrect data in this study surrounding the difference in transplant rates between for-profit and non-profit dialysis centers. Please see link below:

Bauchner H, Flanagin A, Fontanarosa PB. Correcting the Scientific Record—Retraction and Replacement of a Report on Dialysis Ownership and Access to Kidney Transplantation. JAMA. 2020;323(15):1455. doi:10.1001/jama.2020.4368

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rachel Patzer, PhD, MPH Associate Professor Director, Health Services Research Center Department of Medicine Department of Surgery Emory University School of Medicine   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We know that historically, for-profit dialysis facilities have been shown to have lower rates of kidney transplantation than patients who receive treatment in non-profit dialysis facilities. However, these studies are outdated, and did not examine access to living donor transplantation or include the entirety of the end-stage kidney disease population  (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JAMA / 10.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Nariman Sepehrvand, MD Research Associate & PhD Candidate Canadian VIGOUR Centre, and Department of Medicine, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Canada Medical Research: Can you tell us a little bit about the background of this study? Dr. Sepehrvand: As you know the traditional randomized clinical trials (RCT) have been criticized from time to time for the lack of generalizability, high costs and lengthy processes. Pragmatic trials with the primary goal of informing patients, clinicians, healthcare administrators and policy-makers about the effectiveness of biomedical and behavioral interventions have the potential to address those shortcomings by enrolling a population representative of the populations in which the intervention will be eventually applied to and by streamlining and simplifying the trial-related procedures. We knew about the challenges that trialists encounter in the design and implementation of pragmatic trials, so we were wondering how pragmatic or explanatory are cardiovascular (CV) RCTs and if there has been any change over time! (more…)
Author Interviews, Biomarkers, JAMA, Pediatrics / 09.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Elizabeth D. Kantor, PhD MPH Department of Epidemiology and Biostatistics Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center NY, NY MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: There has been recent interest in understanding how exposures in childhood and adolescence relate to later-life health outcomes. Although inflammation is thought to play a role in the etiology of various diseases, little is known about the long-term implications of inflammation in early life. We therefore sought to evaluate how erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR), a marker of inflammation, measured among ostensibly healthy men in late adolescence, relates to subsequent cause-specific mortality. We found that men with high inflammation in late adolescence experienced increased mortality due to cancer and cardiovascular disease. (more…)
Author Interviews, Emergency Care, JAMA, Race/Ethnic Diversity / 09.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Amresh D Hanchate, PhD Research Assistant Professor Department of Medicine, School of Medicine Boston University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: National guidelines require EMS transportation to the nearest suitable hospital. To what extent this occurs and whether this varies by the race and ethnicity of the patient is unknown since there is little to no prior research on destination patterns of EMS-transported patients to hospitals. (more…)
Author Interviews, Heart Disease, JAMA, Occupational Health / 07.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rachel Zeig-Owens, Dr.P.H., MPH FDNY Research Assistant Professor Albert Einstein Medical Center MedicalResearch.com: What are the main findings? Response: We found that the most exposed members, those who arrived first at the World Trade Center (WTC ) site—when the air-borne dust was thickest—have a 44% increased risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD) compared to those who arrived later in the day. This is a level risk that was similar to other known risk factors for CVD.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, Medicare / 06.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Md Momotazur Rahman PhD Associate Professor of Health Services, Policy and Practice Margot Schwartz MPH Doctoral program Brown University MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Although one third of Medicare beneficiaries are currently enrolled in Medicare Advantage (MA), it is difficult to assess the quality of healthcare providers that serve MA beneficiaries, or to compare them to providers that serve Traditional Medicare (TM) beneficiaries. While Medicare Advantage plans are required to cover the same minimum healthcare services as TM, MA beneficiaries receive care from their plan’s network of preferred providers, while TM beneficiaries may select any Medicare-certified provider. The objective of this study is to compare the quality of Home health Agencies (HHAs) that serve Medicare Advantage and TM beneficiaries. Approximately 3.5 million Medicare beneficiaries receive home health care annually.   (more…)
Author Interviews, Cost of Health Care, JAMA, Medical Imaging, UCSF / 05.09.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rebecca Smith-Bindman, MD Professor, Department of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, Epidemiology and Biostatistics Philip R. Lee Institute for Health Policy Studies University of California, San Francisco MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Medical imaging increased rapidly from 2000 to 2006. The rise in imaging can be attributed to improvements in technical aspects of imaging, strong physician and patient demand, and strong financial incentives. While imaging contributes to accurate disease diagnosis and improved treatment, imaging can also increase costs and patient harms, such as incidental findings, overdiagnosis, anxiety, and radiation exposure associated with increased risk of cancer. Potential overuse of diagnostic testing has been addressed by the American Board of Internal Medicine Foundation’s Choosing Wisely Campaign and initiatives by payers to reduce imaging through payment reductions, but there remains uncertainty in the impact of these initiatives on imaging rates.The objective of our study was to evaluate recent trends in medical imaging. Our study assessed imaging from 2000 through 2016 among individuals enrolled in diverse U.S. integrated healthcare systems and among individuals residing in Ontario, Canada and assessed changes in medical imaging utilization over time by country, health system, and patient demographic factors. (more…)
ADHD, Author Interviews, Autism, JAMA, OBGYNE / 30.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Tianyang Zhang, MSc Centre for Psychiatry Research, Department of Clinical Neuroscience Stockholm Health Care Services, Stockholm County Council Department of Medical Epidemiology and Biostatistics Karolinska Institutet Stockholm, Sweden MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We know that births by caesarean delivery are linked to several negative health outcomes in the children, such as obesity, asthma, allergy, and type 1 diabetes. However, the association between c-section and neurodevelopmental and psychiatric disorders has been less studied. In addition, it is unclear whether the extent of this association is different if a caesarean section is performed planned in advance or urgently due to medical reasons during a delivery. (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Opiods, Primary Care / 30.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Hannah T. Neprash, PhD Assistant Professor, Division of Health Policy and Management School of Public Health University of Minnesota  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Physicians play a pivotal role in the opioid epidemic and it's important to understand what factors that drive opioid prescribing. Variation in opioid prescribing across physicians has been well-documented, but there’s very little research on variation within physicians…which is surprising, given the widespread concern about time pressure and cognitive fatigue having a potentially detrimental effect on the quality of care provided by physicians. (more…)
Author Interviews, Breast Cancer, Cancer Research, Genetic Research, JAMA, Ovarian Cancer, USPSTF / 28.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Dr. Carol Mangione, M.D., M.S.P.H., F.A.C.P. Division Chief of General Internal Medicine and Health Services Research Professor of Medicine Barbara A. Levey, MD, and Gerald S. Levey, MD, endowed chair in Medicine David Geffen School of Medicine University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) Professor of public health at the UCLA Fielding School of Public Health.  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Every year, too many American women are faced with the challenge of dealing with a cancer diagnosis related to potentially harmful mutations of the BRCA1 and BRCA2 genes.  However, the Task Force found that there are several steps women can take to determine if they’re potentially at increased risk for BRCA gene mutations – and if genetic counseling and BRCA testing are needed. It is important to note that while some women can benefit from risk assessment, counseling, and testing, these services are not for everyone. (more…)
Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, JAMA, Medicare / 28.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Jose F. Figueroa, MD, MPH Instructor , Harvard Medical School, Department of Medicine Brigham and Women’s Hospital  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Hospitalizations related to ambulatory-care sensitive conditions are widely considered a key measure of access to high-quality ambulatory care. It is included as a quality measure in many national value-based care programs. To date, we do not really know whether rates of these avoidable hospitalizations are meaningfully improving for Medicare beneficiaries over time. (more…)
Author Interviews, Education, JAMA, Opiods, Social Issues / 28.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Isaac Sasson, PhD Department of Sociology and Anthropology and the Herczeg Institute on Aging Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv, Israel MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: Life expectancy at birth in the United States has been declining steadily since 2014, which is very unusual for a high-income country in times of peace. In fact, the last time that life expectancy declined in the US was in the early 1990s, and only briefly. Studies from the past few years have shown that the rise in mortality is concentrated among middle-aged Americans and particularly the lower socioeconomic classes. Our study analyzed over 4.6 million death records in 2010 and 2017 to understand which causes of death account for the rise in mortality among white and black non-Hispanic US adults. In addition, given the substantial socioeconomic inequality in health in the US, we broke down our results by level of education, which is a good proxy for socioeconomic status. Essentially, our goal was to measure how many years of life were lost, on average, to each cause of death across different social groups.  (more…)
Author Interviews, Brain Injury, Erectile Dysfunction, JAMA / 26.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Rachel Grashow PhD Research Associate Department of Environmental Health Football Players Health Study at Harvard University Harvard T.H. Chan  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: It has been previously shown in small studies of boxers and military personnel that traumatic brain injuries can damage the pituitary gland, which serves as the "master controller" of hormone function in the brain. These studies on individuals at risk for repeated head injury found that hits on the head caused deficiencies in certain hormones, such as growth hormone and testosterone, which could have downstream effects on sexual function. Only one large study was conducted that used Taiwanese health insurance data and looked at single traumatic brain injuries and risk of erectile function (ED). In that study, men who experienced a single severe TBI were more than twice as like to report ED after their injury. In light of these findings, important questions remain regarding whether multiple head injuries are associated with pituitary or sexual dysfunction in a large population with other ED-related health issues. The Football Players Health Study at Harvard University asked former NFL players to fill out a questionnaire that interrogated demographic factors, football-related exposures and current health conditions. Specifically, we asked participants to self-report the frequency of ten different concussion symptoms experienced during professional play, as well as whether a clinician had ever recommended or prescribed medication for low testosterone or ED.   (more…)
Author Interviews, JAMA, Kidney Disease, Transplantation / 26.08.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: Alexandre Loupy, MD PhD Nephrologist, Department of Nephrology & Kidney Transplantation Necker Hospital, Paris Head of the Paris Transplant Group (Inserm)  MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: The lack of organs for kidney transplantation is a major public health problem across the world, due to its attributable mortality and excess cost to healthcare systems while waitlisted patients are maintained on chronic dialysis. Nearly 5,000 people in the US and 3,500 people in Europe die each year while waiting for a kidney transplant. Yet in the US, over 3,500 donated kidneys are discarded annually, representing almost 18% of the available organs, while the discard rate in France is only 6,8%, though these countries have similar organ allocation systems and offer the same treatments to patients after transplant. We thus compared the use of donated kidneys in the US to France from 2004-2014 in much more depth, using a new approach based on validated analytic methods and computer simulation.  (more…)