In the hope of saving the lives of more people waiting for transplants, the city of New York is working on a plan to deploy a special ambulance to collect the bodies of people who have died suddenly from heart attacks, accidents and other emergencies and try to preserve their organs, the Washington Post reports. [Sign in to read the full article...]

A simultaneous kidney-pancreas transplant improves the likelihood of long-term survival in patients with type 1 diabetes and end-stage renal disease (ESRD) over kidney transplant alone, according to a German study. Researchers at the University of Heidelberg analyzed the long-term outcomes of more than 11,000 patients with type 1 diabetes and ESRD who had a kidney [Sign in to read the full article...]

Patients with a progressive fibrosis of the lungs that is fatal within a few years of diagnosis may finally have some reason for hope, HealthDay News reports. In a new study presented last week at the American Thoracic Society’s annual meeting in Toronto, Japanese researchers say daily use of the drug pirfenidone improved the lung [Sign in to read the full article...]

For patients undergoing kidney transplantation, treatment with the anti-rejection drug sirolimus may lead to an increased risk of diabetes, according to a study in the July issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology. “We demonstrated a robust association between sirolimus and diabetes after transplantation in a large group of kidney transplant recipients [Sign in to read the full article...]

Gov. Sarah Palin announced last month that more than half of Alaska’s roughly 670,000 residents have registered as organ and tissue donors, the McClatchy Tribune Business News reports. Bruce Zalneraitis, CEO of Life Alaska Donor Services, said Alaska is the second state to make the distinction; Utah was the first. That’s no easy feat for [Sign in to read the full article...]