( horus stimulate red blood cell product...)Bioartificial kidney under study at MCG

The new device for kidney failure adds billions of kidney cells that can perform many of these important kidney functions. Human proximal tubule cells are collected from kidneys obtained by the National Disease Research Interchange, a nonprofit organization that provides researchers with tissues and organs anatomically unsuitable for transplant.

The cells are grown into the walls of thousands of hollow fibers contained in a cartridge similar to those used for traditional dialysis.

With dialysis, a patient's blood runs through the fibers and a solution with the normal composition of electrolytes runs on the outside. Through osmosis, waste products in the blood migrate across the fibers into the solution. The now-dirty solution is discarded and the cleaner blood is given back to the patient. In the study, all patients receive this standard approach to cleaning the blood.

But two-thirds of the study participants take the additional step of having the liquid portion of their filtered blood, called an ultrafiltrate ?which would contain remaining toxins, electrolytes, mediators of inflammation and such ?removed. The liquid is run through the cell-lined fibers of a second cartridge, while the blood is run on the outside of the fibers.

"(These cells) reabsorb substances from the ultrafiltrate ?and put them back into the blood on the outside of the fiber, which is pumped back into the body. The stuff that isn't pumped out is just like urine: it goes in the toilet," Dr. Szerlip says.

Preliminary findings on 10 patients at the University of Michigan Medical Center and Cleveland Clinic Foundation showed the device was safe and produced desired results such as reducing circulating inflammatory mediators. Study results were published in the October 2004 issue of Kidney Internatio
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Source:Medical College of Georgia