Category : News & Events

As one of our patients, you already appreciate what a difference integrated kidney health care makes in your life. Through education, information sharing and taking care of your emotional and psychological needs, we are there for you in what can be a difficult journey to better health. As you probably know, new research is the reason we can improve that care. It is health research, however, that is most difficult to fund in today’s financial climate. If in your journey […]

Dr. Istvan Mucsi gave a research in progress presentation at the Division of Nephrology, UHN on September 30th. His presentation is available for viewing here. [pdfjs-viewer url=https://nefros.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/Improving-access-to-LDKT-Istvan-Mucsi-Sept-30-2016-Short.pdf viewer_width=100% viewer_height=600px fullscreen=false download=false print=false]

Eight members of the Kidney Health Education and Research Group attended the “2016 Canadian Society of Transplantation, Canadian National Transplant Research Program, Société Québécoise de Transplantation Joint Scientific Meeting” from October 13 to 16, 2016 in Québec City, Québec. Attendees included: Aarushi Bansal, Candice Richardson, Dmitri Belenko, Dorothy Wong, Evan Tang, Franz Marie Gumabay, Sarah Cao, and Dr. Istvan Mucsi. After a ten hour road trip starting at Toronto General Hospital, the team arrived at the Hilton Québec—the CST-CNTRP-SQT Joint […]

The Psycho-social Nephrology Team at UHN-Toronto General Hospital is proud to provide on-going support in saving lives and supporting patients in need. The team is committed to donating blood every 3 months and having been do so since June 2016. In September, we arranged to drop in to Canadian Blood Services’ blood donor clinic on College Street in Toronto, and several team members rolled up their sleeves to give blood. We are always on the lookout for opportunities to participate […]

Living donor kidney transplantation is the best treatment for many patients with end-stage kidney disease, since it provides better survival, better quality of life than dialysis and the waiting time is much shorter compared to deceased donor transplant. Our preliminary data suggest that patients with depression and patients with African or Asian background have substantially less chance to get a living donor kidney transplant compared to patients without depression, or to Caucasian patients. The underlying reasons for these disparities are […]

Mental health disorders and a history of non-adherence can be barriers to completing transplant workup and undergoing kidney transplantation. This is supported by our study recently published in the journal Transplantation. Our team collected data from more than 1700 patients and examined the association between mental health and non-adherence, and workup completion and/or kidney transplant. Patients with a history of mental health issues or of non-adherence had 17% and 21% lower rates of completing transplant workup, respectively, within two years […]

Adapting the Explore Transplant program to Ontario’s cultural and ethnic diversity involved a dedicated team of patients, physicians, and nurses. With the cooperation of six transplant centres across the province, the program was thoroughly reviewed to ensure that it meets the needs of Ontarian patients. The finalized version of the Explore Transplant Ontario program was successfully released in May 2016. Following the launch, a training was held by Dr. Amy Waterman and Ms. Christina Goalby for nurses, physicians, and students […]

The impact of mental illness on renal outcomes has been insufficiently documented in diabetic patient populations. Our team’s study, recently published in the Diabetes Care journal of the American Diabetes Association, examined whether comorbid depression in diabetic patients is linked to an increased risk of Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD). The study concluded that the presence of depression was associated with a 20% higher risk of developing CKD, as well as an increased all-cause mortality. Effective mental health interventions may therefore […]

To address the lack of transplant education in Ontario, Dr. Mucsi and Dr. Novak teamed up with Dr. Amy Waterman, creator of the widely successful program ‘Explore Transplant’. The program, which was developed by Dr. Waterman at UCLA, aims to dispel myths and misconceptions and explain the transplant process from both medical and past patients’ perspectives. Explore Transplant helps patients and potential donors make informed, knowledgeable, and empowered decisions about their health and treatment options. Dr. Mucsi and Dr. Novak then worked to […]