The American Society of Nephrology (ASN) recently selected Csaba P. Kovesdy, MD, FASN, director of the Clinical Outcomes and Clinical Trials Program in Nephrology at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center (UTHSC) and chief of the Nephrology Section at the Memphis VA Medical Center (VAMC), as an ASN representative for a new data harmonization initiative. The Fred Hatch Professor of Medicine, Dr. Kovesdy will serve with five other experts in chronic kidney disease from around the world to develop consistent messaging about kidney disease worldwide.
“I am honored to serve as a representative for the American Society of Nephrology on this initiative,” Dr. Kovesdy said. “Kidney disease affects millions around the world each year and there is currently no cure. Our objective will be to produce a consensus statement about the incidence, prevalence, consequences, and burden of kidney disease globally, aiming to have a uniformly agreed-upon message to the public and to policymakers across the globe.”
At a joint leadership meeting in May 2016, the American Society of Nephrology, the European Renal Association-European Dialysis and Transplant Association (ERA-EDTA), and the International Society of Nephrology (ISN) began discussion on new projects on which they could collaborate. One of the initiatives is the data harmonization project that chronicles the global burden of kidney disease. Each society has elected two representatives for the project — a society leader and a senior staff member — for a total of six project participants. Dr. Kovesdy was selected to work on behalf of ASN because of his globally-recognized work in the epidemiology of kidney disease. The other society leader representatives are Kitty J. Jager, MD, PhD, of The Netherlands on behalf of the ERA-EDTA, and Robyn Langham, PhD, of Australia on behalf of the ISN.
“The three organizations have been operating in parallel for some time and already have collaborations in certain areas of kidney research,” Dr. Kovesdy said. “Together with other leading experts, we will review relevant literature and synthesize the results into a succinct consensus document, which will then be utilized by all three organizations in their quest to raise global awareness of kidney disease.”
The project is slated to be worked on throughout 2017, though no firm dates have been set.