A trans-Atlantic
research team hopes to free people in chronic renal failure from the dialysis
machines and time-consuming hospital visits that govern their lives. The
partners, who work in Los Angeles, London and Vincenza, are prototyping two
lightweight devices that patients can wear.
Weighing in at five
pounds, the wearable artificial kidney, or WAK, includes a control device using
Bluetooth technology, worn around the neck, and a belt connected to catheters
containing the filtration system that does the work of the kidneys.
Vincenza was the
site of the international debut of WAK. There, with Dr. Claudio Ronco, director
of the Department of Nephrology of the Hospital of San Bartolo, 14 patients are
trying out the portable dialysis system that could change the lives of many
patients around the world.
For more
information, see www.nefrologiavicenza.it
