Sapiens foundation to join hands with Japanese for 'internal dialysis

Chennai: Human trials on a molecule that is expected to help in the removal of waste by the body's own system so that chronic kidney failure patients can live without dialysis - nicknamed internal dialysis - will begin in Chennai in collaboration with Japanese scientists, senior nephrologist Sapiens Foundation chairman Dr Rajan Ravichandran said here on Saturday.

"Animal studies on the function of apoptosis inhibition in macrophage (AIM) done in Japan have been successful. We are in talks with them about a research collaboration. If this molecule works, it will be the most suitable alternative to dialysis," he said at the 25th-anniversary celebrations of the foundation amidst loud cheers from an audience comprising senior doctors, judges, industrialists, philanthropists, actors, and patients.

The foundation began in 1997 with small funding from one of the patients and it began its work by offering subsidised dialysis to patients. Soon, the foundation was involved in creating awareness programmes for the prevention of kidney diseases. It took messages about the need to manage diabetes, hypertension, and periodic health checks for early detection of diseases.

"We introduced self-test kits to check protein leaks in the kidney among 5,000 students. The results were published in peer-reviewed journals and presented in international conferences. We believe that if we introduce 24-hour urine tests in annual health checks we will be able to identify kidney diseases at a stage when it is reversible," he said.

In 2010, the foundation launched a war against a silent killer - salt with an aggressive campaign asking people to reduce salt to increase life. The foundation has been lobbying with government agencies and the food industry to declare the quantity of salt used in packed foods. WHO has called for countries to bring in policies to cut down on salt, and India is among countries that does not have legislation or guidelines to cut salt in food, he said.

Indian society of hypertension president Dr S N Narasingan said salt increases the risk of hypertension and even without hypertension high salt intake can damage blood vessels and cause heart diseases, he said.