The Countdown is on to TTS 2018!

There remains a little over a week to the start of the Congress and many of you have already started your way to Spain to spend an amazing week with your colleagures from around the world.

Not registered yet? You can still register onsite as of June 30!

 VISIT TTS2018.ORG FOR MORE INFORMATION

The Third International Consensus Guidelines on the Management of Cytomegalovirus in Solid-organ Transplantation Featured in this month's issue

Transplantation - June 2018 - Volume 102 - Issue 6

The Third TTS CMV Guidelines are released this month defining the current state of knowledge for management of CMV. The issue also contains a summary of the FDA public workshop on ABMR; great papers on liver transplantation especially in pediatrics; and news from the UK on waitlist management; news on islet transplant outcomes and much more...

Link to this issue

TTS Member Access - Click here to log into your account and click the open access link to Transplantation Journal

Medicine for her diabetes kept her alive -- and it was killing her, too 

June 12 - There was a nice article featured on CNN last week featuring Raja Kandaswamy from University of Minnesota. This is a nice human interest story.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

ISN-TTS Sister Transplant WebinAR Providing TIPS to make  your application SHINE

Watch our webinar to get some tips

Sister Centers Programs link renal and transplant centers in low-and-middle income countries with centers of excellence in the developed world. There are now 65 active Sister Centers partnership and 13 of them are focused on transplantation.

The deadline to apply for the ISN Sister Renal Centers Program and the ISN-TTS Sister Transplant Centers Program is set for October 1st, 2018.

Learn to make your application stand out and register for a special webinar to be broadcast on July 12, 2018 between 2PM and 3PM CEST.

Peter Kerr, Chair of the Sister Renal Centers Program, and Philip J. O'Connell, Past-President of The Transplantation Society and Director of Transplantation, will guide you through each step of the application process. They will share some handy tips on how to prepare a successful application and answer any questions you may have.

CLICK HERE TO SIGNUP

TTS 2018 - Highlighted Corporate Symposium

TTS 2018 - Madrid - IFEMA Feria de Madrid, Spain
Join us at the Chiesi Symposium on 2nd July, h 16:30-17:30 (Room 103 | North Convention Centre)

Session full program:

Might different patients need different approaches? New concepts on tacrolimus metabolism and pharmacokinetics.
Chaired by Prof. J. Pascual - Spain

• Clinical sensitivity to tacrolimus pharmacokinetics
  Prof. R. Oberbauer - Austria
• Tacrolimus fast metabolisers: how to identify them beyond race and genotype
  Prof. K. Budde - Germany

About Chiesi:

Based in Parma, Italy, Chiesi Farmaceutici is an international Healthcare Group, with over 80 years of experience and a strong focus on research, development, production and the commercialisation of innovative drugs in the Respiratory, Neonatology, Rare Diseases and Special Care Therapeutic Areas. Chiesi has been present in the solid organ transplant area since 2014, and keeps working every day to put its expertise at the service of specialists, to help them find the right immunosuppressive approach for each different transplanted patient.

VISIT CHIESI WEBSITE TO FIND OUT MORE ABOUT US - WWW.CHIESI.COM 

INTERNATIONAL SOCIETY FOR ORGAN DONATION AND PROCUREMENT (2021)

DEADLINE EXTENDED TO JULY 12

The International Society for Organ Donation and Procurement aims to foster, promote and develop all aspects of organ and tissue donation and procurement. The ultimate aim is to increase the supply of high quality organs and tissue to match patients' need and to promote countries increasing performance towards self-sufficiency and improved opportunity for transplantation.

Every two years, the ISODP Congress brings together clinicians and scientists from all parts of the world in the fields of organ procurement and donation.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

Transplantation - Featured Article

Submitted by Dr Andrea Schlegel, Editorial Fellow, Transplantation.

The Impact of Liver Graft Injury on Cancer Recurrence Posttransplantation.
Li C-X, Man K, Lo C-M
Transplantation. 2017;101:2665-2670

This excellent review deals with the challenging field of cancer recurrence after liver transplantation. The authors discuss the impact of graft quality and ischaemia/reperfusion injury leading to environmental advantages with relevance for cancer cells to migrate into the transplanted liver. The authors discuss the impact of different graft types, including living related liver donation, livers from donation after circulatory death donors and steatotic grafts. In addition, they provide a detailed discussion on how an impaired endothelial barrier function in combination with hypoxia and sterile inflammation may modify tumour cell adhesion, migration, and invasion. Finally, the authors discuss the role of progenitor and other immune regulatory cells in the modified microenvironment of a liver transplant. Understanding risk factors, consequences and mechanisms of tumor reoccurrence will be critical in implementing novel treatments.

READ MORE

Transplantation Journal - Vol. 4, No. 6, June 2018

The June issue of Transplantation Direct contains articles and communications on a variety of topics in transplantation. Among the topics reported in kidney transplantation are the interim results of the Amsterdam, LEden, GROningen randomized trial testing immunosuppression minimization (steroids/tacrolimus) in over 300 patients. A study from the UK assesses the value of low clearance transplantation clinics that support the management of recipients with failing kidney transplants. In liver transplantation, a large Eurotransplant-data-based study examines the impact of organ implantation time on outcomes, and an interesting case control study looks at the association of DSA development on late-onset PTLD. In the area of infectious disease research in organ and stem cell transplant recipients, the meaning of CMV PCR "blips" is examined and the implications discussed. Organ donation issues are also addressed in this Direct issue. The Canadian National Transplant Research Program reports on their survey results defining future research priorities in organ and stem cell donation. Also, a Living Organ Video Educated Donors (LOVED) program aims to address living donor kidney transplantation disparities in African Americans; the results and impact of this program are reported on here. We hope that you find this content interesting and useful, and look forward to future contributions from your group.

CLICK TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Study Seeks to Improve Kidney Transplant Outcomes

From left, Liise K. Kayler, MD; John Reinier F. Narvaez, MD (He will be presenting at TTS 2018, click for presentation details); and medical student Kevin Espino have published a study on using enhanced recovery after surgery protocols to improve kidney transplant patient outcomes.

May 30 - Improving outcomes for kidney transplant patients is the goal of newly published research led by Liise K. Kayler, MD, clinical professor of surgery.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

Hard-to-Treat Infections May Not Impact Survival of CF Patients After Lung Transplant, Study Shows

One-year survival after a lung transplant of cystic fibrosis (CF) patients chronically infected with antibiotic-resistant bacteria is similar to those without infections, according to a retrospective analysis of data from the International Society of Heart and Lung Transplantation (ISHLT) Thoracic Transplant Registry.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

Understanding immune system interplay to improve organ transplant success

Credit: Babraham Institute

May 31 - A rare opportunity to analyse both blood and tissue samples from human transplant recipients has allowed immunology researchers at the Babraham Institute to pinpoint how an immunosuppressive drug works to prevent the production of antibodies against the transplanted tissue.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

LOng-TIME TTS MEMBER, Robert S. Gaston honored with  Lifetime Achievement Award

The Transplantation Society congratulates Dr. Gaston on behalf of all his fellow TTS members.

Dr. Gaston is a nephrologist who has dedicated more than 30 years to medicine was awarded with the highest honor that the AST bestows – the Lifetime Achievement Award. In addition to his broad experience in hypertension, immunology, public policy, and solid organ transplantation, much of Dr. Gaston's work has focused on drug development to address the challenge of improving long-term graft survival in kidney transplant recipients. He has been involved in clinical investigation since the 1990s, with research funded by industry, foundation, and government, and he has authored more than 300 published articles, chapters, and abstracts. Dr. Gaston's expertise is nationally recognized and has resulted in ongoing consultation for the National Institutes of Health (NIH), US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), several academic institutions, and industry (biotech and large pharma).

Pig organs for human patients: A challenge fit for CRISPR

May 30 - Through a new license, Harvard lab's innovations in genome engineering might solve the organ transplant shortage

Co-founded by Professor George Church and former HMS doctoral student Luhan Yang, Ph.D. (pictured), eGenesis has exclusive access, in the field of xenotransplantation, to foundational intellectual property (IP) on CRISPR, as well as certain subsequent innovations. The license includes IP relating to the Church Lab's 2012 breakthrough use of CRISPR, led by Yang and Prashant Mali, Ph.D., to edit the genome of human cells. (Photo courtesy of eGenesis.)

Over the past few years, researchers led by George Church, Ph.D., the Robert Winthrop Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and a Core Faculty Member of Harvard's Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, have made important strides toward engineering the genomes of pigs to make their cells compatible with the human body. A healthy heart for a patient in desperate need might one day come from a pig.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE 

Don't miss our July 1 Pre-Congress Workshop @TTS 2018
Xenotransplantation - Advancing to the Clinic

The field of xenotransplantation has made significant progress over the last 5 years, with cell and organ graft survival in large animal models reaching almost 3 years. The aim of the workshop is to present the most recent advances and the outlook for the first clinical trials.

CLICK HERE TO SEE ALL AVAILABLE WORKSHOPS AT TTS2018 

UK - Case Study: DHSC's 'opt-out' organ donation consultation campaign attracts 17,000 responses

DHSC targeted families with campaign for consultation on organ donor opt-in

May 30 - Health comms specialists have been challenged to encourage people to open up about a subject many are unwilling to face - whether or not to donate their organs, or those of their loved ones, after their death.

CLICK HERE FOR DETAILS

Researchers find secret of newt species' amazing regeneration

Japanese fire belly newt (cynops pyrrhogaste) (Provided by Chikafumi Chiba)

A type of Japanese newt can regrow its tail, eyes, brain and even parts of its heart throughout its lifetime thanks to a specific type of red blood cell, a Japanese research team has found.

CLICK TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

The promise of regenerating tissues and organs from inside the body

A three-layered sphere created in the Lim Lab by programming synNotch receptors on groups of cells.
(Wendell Lim/UC San Francisco)

June 1 - Regenerative medicine holds tremendous promise for many ailments, from curing diabetes with pancreatic cell transplants to growing new organs for transplant. But because these approaches generate tissue ex vivo, or outside the body, scientists developing them all face the same conundrum: How can they connect these externally developed tissues to the bloodstream and the rest of the body so they can thrive?

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE

Transplantation - Featured Article

Submitted by Dr Karen Keung, Editorial Fellow, Transplantation.

Reduced TCR Signaling Contributes to Impaired Th17 Responses in Tolerant Kidney Transplant Recipients. 
Nova-Lamperti E, Romano M, Christakoudi S, et al.
Transplantation. 2018;102(1):e10-e17

The development of operational tolerance in transplantation has been demonstrated to be associated with a numerous B cell related immune alterations, whilst the role of other lymphocyte subsets is less clear. In this study, CD4+ T cells from tolerant kidney transplant recipients (n = 17) were compared with those from patients with chronic rejection (n = 32) and healthy volunteers (n = 12) assessing their gene expression profile, phenotype and function upon activation. Tolerant patients were found to possess fewer Th17 cells, exhibited reduced Th17 responses after CD3/28 activation, and reduced TCR signaling which was linked with a decrease in IL-17 production by CD4+ T cells.
The authors have presented some novel evidence suggesting that incomplete Th17 pathway integrity may help facilitating clinical tolerance.

READ MORE

Timing is everything to build kidneys from scratch

June 4 - Researchers show stem cells fashion kidney functions based on when they converge

Developing human nephron, the filtering unit of the kidney.
Credit: Image by Nils O. Lindstrom and Tracy Tran/McMahon Lab USC Stem Cell

Perfectly punctual or fashionably late, it takes all kinds to build a kidney. So it is for stem cells building kidney tissue discovered timing is critical as the precise arrival of progenitor cells dictates their form and function in the kidney. The finding will help fabricate kidney components for use in drug tests and treatment of renal disease.

CLICK HERE TO READ THE FULL ARTICLE