John Pickering • May 05, 2017 •
Sick of writing boring text reports? Take a leaf out of Christchurch nephrologist Dr Suetonia Palmer’s (@SuetoniaPalmer) book and make a visual abstract report. Here are two she has created recently based on data collected about organ donation and end stage renal failure by ANZDATA (@ANZDATARegistry). Enjoy. ps. The featured … Read More
John Pickering • Jun 19, 2015 •
New Zealand is the home of Home Haemodialysis and Christchurch the hub. Sending people home to dialyse is not only more convenient for them and more cost effective, but also has been shown to reduce mortality. However, is this reduction in mortality sustained across changes in dialysis medicine over time? This is an important question […] … Read More
John Pickering • Nov 27, 2014 •
Everyone said it did, but how did they know and by how much? Statements like “The development of AKI [Acute Kidney Injury] after CPB [Cardiopulmonary Bypass Surgery] is associated with a significant increase in infectious complications, an increase in length of hospital stay, and greater mortality.” (Kumar & Suneja, Anaesthesiology 2011 14(4):964) are common place […] … Read More
John Pickering • Nov 07, 2014 •
In the case of dialysis dependent acute kidney injury patients this is a question which Dr Dinna Cruz and colleagues (University of California San Diego) are asking and seeking opinions from both nephrologists and non-nephrologist doctors and nurses involved in care of dialysis patients. It was a question which arose out of discussions at this […] … Read More
John Pickering • Mar 13, 2014 •
If it weren’t for your kidneys where would you be? You’d be in the hospital or infirmary, If you didn’t have two functioning kidneys. (with apologies to John Clarke aka Fred Dagg) Happy World Kidney Day everyone. This blog started off life as $100 Dialysis because I believe that if we can make a computer … Continue reading → … Read More
John Pickering • Nov 18, 2013 •
Some recent successes of University of Otago Christchurch researchers: Chlorine bleach key in disease? Professor Tony Kettle from the Centre for Free Radical Research has won a prestigious Marsden Fund grant to better understand a ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ chemical with a role in heart disease, cancer, cystic fibrosis, and rheumatoid arthritis. Professor Kettle will investigate … Continue reading → … Read More
John Pickering • Jul 06, 2013 •
CNN is reporting Nelson Mandela is on dialysis. http://t.co/HZTIlmGrtO. This means he is suffering from Acute Kidney Injury, the disease I study. Having to have dialysis is very serious. Unfortunately, survival rates are only about 50% by this stage, less in the very elderly. Dialysis is not a treatment, merely a support for the kidney to … Continue reading » … Read More
John Pickering • May 29, 2013 •
When they say your tests are positive for a disease just what do they mean? If it is a simple blood or urine test often they mean that the concentration measured is outside (above or below) some reference range. In my field of Kidney Attack (a.k.a. acute kidney injury: AKI) two tests of the same … Continue reading » … Read More
John Pickering • Jan 16, 2013 •
$100 Dialysis is my vision. University of California San Francisco researchers are doing some exciting research that may well be a step on the way. They are developing an implantable artificial kidney . They have a facebook page http://www.facebook.com/ArtificialKidney for those wishing to follow progress. $13M is needed to bring it clinical trials – I … Continue reading » … Read More
John Pickering • Sep 17, 2012 •
I read the following in Kidney Health New Zealand’s annual report and with KHNZ and Paula Martin’s permission I have reproduced her great report. I am thrilled to see such important research being undertaken and as you’ll read, Paula has great motivation. Paula is a PhD Candidate in the Health Services Research Centre, School of Government, Victoria … Continue reading » … Read More