As a dyad, this team is doubling the number of kidney transplants performed locally — and at the same time reducing the number that are needed.
Kidney disease can upend a life in mere months — and it’s significantly more likely to impact Black and Latina/o/x patients, who together make up more than 40% of Travis County residents.
Nicole Turgeon, M.D., and Tessa Novick, M.D., have wholly different approaches when it comes to addressing the ways kidney disease plays out in Central Texas: The former is a transplant surgeon, and the latter is a health disparities researcher with a background in social work.
Both approaches are key to bringing the best possible kidney and transplant care to residents of Travis County.
Putting Central Texas on Track to Double Its Transplants
When Turgeon moved to Austin in fall 2019 to launch the Abdominal Transplant Center and Pediatric Abdominal Transplant Center, both clinics of UT Health Austin in partnership with Ascension Seton, it meant that Central Texas was on track to double the number of transplants performed in the region annually, including opportunities for nondirected (anonymous) donors to make a local impact. Since the adult center launched in late 2021, six Central Texans have received kidneys, and nine living donors have given theirs.
“What an academic transplant program can provide is not just clinical excellence, but building the next generation of transplant professionals and studying ways to address disparities in access to transplantation,” Turgeon says. “So what better way to advance the field than starting the program in a large capital city where we can serve the community and accomplish these goals?”
TESSA NOVICK, M.D., &
NICOLE TURGEON, M.D.
Preventing Severe Disease for the Most Vulnerable
And Novick, a practicing nephrologist and researcher who got her start in social work, comes at the issue from the prevention side, with an eye toward the social determinants of health. Now, in partnership with Central Health and the Mexican Consulate, Novick is piloting a screening program funded by the National Kidney Foundation to pair community health workers with recent immigrants found to have kidney disease. Within six months, the program has enrolled 49 participants, 65% of whom have already been able to obtain insurance and a primary care physician with help from their community health worker in navigating the care system.
And for other vulnerable populations, like people experiencing homelessness, Novick’s research points to housing insecurity as a primary driver of worsening kidney disease.
“We cannot treat someone without understanding their environment, where they’re living, whether they’re able to access services and care,” she explains. “And they cannot be expected to get better without a stable environment in which to live.”