Sentara Grows Kidney Donor Pool With Two Innovations

The kidney/pancreas transplant team at Sentara Norfolk General Hospital has begun transplanting kidneys from donors who are positive for heptitis-C into recipients who are negative. This innovation in the treatment of hepatitis-C has the potential to grow the pool of potential donors each year by 30 or 40. Under the protocol, informed patients accept the infected kidney knowing they will likely develop hepatitis-C. An eight-week drug regimen using Mavyret™ then kills the virus in most patients according to published research.

"This is an enormous breakthrough," says Harland Rust, MD, nephrologist and medical director of the Sentara kidney/pancreas transplant program. "Clinical trials show this procedure to be reliable and safe." For recipients, it means getting off the transplant waiting list sooner.

"I wanted my life back," says Renee Murphy of Norfolk, who chose to receive a hepatitis-C positive kidney and is now taking the drug therapy regimen. "I can't wait to travel to see my 10-year-old grandson play hockey," she says. She could not when she was undergoing kidney dialysis three times a week for four hours at a time. "Now, I can live like a used to."

On the remote workup front, the Sentara transplant team can now conduct evaluations and workups of potential living kidney donors remotely using a secure health care platform through Zoom. The team worked up a woman from Auckland, New Zealand, who conducted interviews with the transplant team remotely while a nephrologist in Auckland performed most of the medical testing required. Lesley Jenkins then flew 6,600 miles around the globe and quarantined for two weeks at her brother, Steve Morrison's home in Norfolk, before giving him one of her kidneys.

"This shows us we can safely work up living donors remotely and save them lots of time and money for travel and lodging if they live far away," says Peggy Bradshaw, RN, manager of renal transplants for Sentara Healthcare.

"We had a few final tests to do before the transplant," says Thomas McCune, MD, Steve's nephrologist in Norfolk. "But thanks to the remote workup, we were pretty sure before she left New Zealand that she would be good to go." As for Lesley, the travel and COVID-19 quantines on both ends of her trip were worth it.

"It's family," she says. "No matter how far apart you live, it's family and it's what you do."