The National Institutes of Minority Health and Health Disparities has awarded $2.6 million over five years to the Emory Transplant Center and six other transplant centers and organizations in the Southeastern Kidney Transplant Coalition. The funding will continue the RaDIANT (Reducing Disparities in Access to Kidney Transplantation) Community Study in Georgia for another five years and expand it to South Carolina and North Carolina.
Emory Transplant Center epidemiologist Dr. Rachel Patzer, director of the Transplant Health Services and Outcomes Program at Emory, is principal investigator of the grant and Dr. Stephen Pastan, medical director of the Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program, is chair of the Southeastern Kidney Transplant Coalition and a study co-investigator.
“The grant will go a long way to help us expand some of the work we are doing in Georgia dialysis facilities and include North Carolina and South Carolina, with an emphasis on improving patient access to referral for a transplant evaluation,” says Dr. Patzer. “Our prior work showed that our interventions in the RaDIANT Community Study found that referral for transplantation nearly doubled and racial disparities were reduced. Now we will test whether we find similar effects in a larger, regional population.
