Call For Support

Shuvo Roy in lab

Dear Friends:

The Kidney Project is bringing together researchers from across the nation to create an implantable bioartificial kidney that will change the lives of kidney failure patients. The bioartificial kidney will offer a new treatment option beyond the short-term solution of renal dialysis and the longer-term solution of a kidney transplant for which donor organs are severely limited.

The need is great.

We are driven by the fact that kidney failure affects more than 650,000 people per year in the United States, and the number of patients in our country diagnosed with kidney failure is increasing 5% each year. Kidney failure patients who rely on dialysis alone face a poor quality of life and a bleak long-term prognosis. What’s more, kidney failure accounts for 7% of the Medicare budget yet only 1% of all Medicare patients.

A solution is under way.

The bioartificial kidney is about the size of a coffee-cup. It will be surgically implanted without the need for tubes or tethers, powered by the patient’s own blood pressure, and requires no anti-rejection drugs. It will perform many of the metabolic, endocrine, and immunological functions of a healthy kidney. We’ve made tremendous progress already. We completed Phase 1 of our development and are now in Phase 2, fine-tuning the device components, ensuring safety, and scaling for manufacturing.

Private support is critical.

The intensity of Phase 2 will require $3 million per year. To meet our deadline, we will rely increasingly on donations from individuals and private institutions. This support will complement federal grant funding and will allow us to continue the pace of our work to complete the battery of tasks that will culminate with first-in-human testing. Every gift, therefore, to The Kidney Project brings us that much closer to saving and improving the lives of patients with kidney failure.

We have the expertise to succeed.

We have the expertise and votes of confidence to bring the bioartificial kidney to kidney failure patients. In fact, mid-year in 2015, The Kidney Project was selected by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to participate in a new regulatory approval program called Expedited Access Pathway (EAP). It’s intended to bring breakthrough medical device technologies to patients faster and more efficiently. The home base of The Kidney Project is the University of California, San Francisco, which is known worldwide as an institution that attacks biomedical problems with the kind of interdisciplinary zeal required to carry forward an effort this bold.

Please help us move this project forward.

Sincerely,

Shuvo Roy, PhD
Director, The Kidney Project
Professor
Department of Bioengineering and Therapeutic Sciences
University of California, San Francisco

Make a gift today in support of The Kidney Project

For additional information on opportunities for private support, contact:
[email protected]

For industry and venture capital partnership opportunities, contact:
Shuvo Roy, PhD, Director, The Kidney Project
[email protected]

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