| Dr. Jennifer Pate is a psychiatrist in private practice in Houston specializing in patients with liver disease. About half her patients are on treatment for hepatitis C and the other half are transplant patients. |  |
| Doctor on Call By Jennifer Pate, M.D.
Lactulose as a Life Preserver: What patients and caregivers need to know about Hepatic Encephalopathy One of the many vital jobs performed by the liver is the removal of toxins from the bloodstream When a diseased liver is not able to perform this task, a variety of problems may develop. A common problem experienced by patients with cirrhosis is hepatic encephalopathy. Simply put, hepatic encephalopathy is confusion associated with underlying liver disease. There are many suspected causes of this type of confusion, but researchers believe the basic problem is the inability of a patient’s liver to clear toxins such as ammonia from the circulation. When ammonia and other toxins accumulate, symptoms including mood (sadness or anxiety) or personality changes (irritability or agitation), poor coordination, drowsiness, memory problems or coma may develop. In more severe cases, patients may become violent or extremely sleepy and difficult to awaken.
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 | 2010 U.S. Transplant Games
Join us July 30 - August 4, 2010 in Madison, Wisconsin.
Participation is organized according to regions. Our region is Team Southeast Texas. The coordinator for our region is Marion Johnson.
You can contact her at:
(800-961-5683; mjohnson@nkfset.org.)
The 'games' involved are: badminton, basketball, bowling, cycling, swimming, racquetball, 5k road race, table tennis, tennis, track & field, and volleyball.
You have to be more than six months post-transplant and have stable graft function and be medically fit, according to your doctor (there is a form your doctor has to complete).
Your application to participate has to be submitted no more than four months beforehand and no later than one month before.
The Goal for Team Southeast Texas is '50 athletes.'
| Partners Alert! Senate Bill 565 is coming up soon before Congress. It is a bill to amend title XVIII of the Social Security Act to provide continued entitlement to coverage for immunosuppressive drugs furnished to beneficiaries under the Medicare Program that have received a kidney transplant and whose entitlement to coverage would otherwise expire, and for other purposes. Please help us get this bill passed by contacting our Texas Senators John Cornyn, Kay Bailey Hutchinson and our Representatives. Let them know we would like them to support this proposed legislation and ask them to support expanding coverage to ALL transplant recipients. Please ask friends and family in other states to contact their Senators also. Contact can be made by email or by toll free calls to the Senator’s offices in the home state or in Washington D.C. Senate Bill 565 Information » Senator John Cornyn » Senator Kay Bailey Hutchinson » Find your Representatives » National Kidney Foundation » |
| Visit us at our Transplant Support Group Meetings
Meetings for 2010:
September 13
October 4
November 1
December 6
Learn More »
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Organ Donors Turning Out In Force In Texas
Doubling of rolls credited to law requiring DPS clerks to ask question. The Houston Chronicle had a wonderful story by Cindy George on July 27th about a dramatic increase in donor registrations. A new law went into effect on January 1st requiring Texas DPS clerks to ask all driver's license and I.D. card applicants whether they would like to register as organ donors. Since then nearly 70,000 a month have joined the pool.
Read the whole story »
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The Colonel and His Ladies
“Ralph Katz stole the show, once again, in this year’s Gilbert & Sullivan production of Patience!”
| Liver Life Walk
Houston 2010 
Ten representatives of the Memorial Hermann Transplant Support Group participated Saturday June 5th in helping raise funds for the American Liver Foundation, by walking 5K at Terry Hershey Park. This was the first of what the American Liver Foundation hopes will become an annual event. You can find out more about the mission of ALF at their website www.liverfoundation.org We stayed cool at the Liver Life Walk, held at Terry Hershey Park on Saturday, June 5, 2010 thanks to our personalized fans.
Gerry G. Rife
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