2025-05-07 Instagram Live - Kidney Q&A

IG Live 05.07.2025 – DPC Education Center’s Healthcare Consultant, Velma Scantlebury, MD, Live on Instagram to answer your kidney related questions. This month, Dr. Scantlebury answers questions on kidney disease and transplant in children, the importance of vitamin D, how organ matching on the transplant list works, and many more kidney-related topics.

Important to know your numbers, going to the doctor, know you blood pressure, cholesterol, blood sugar and kidney function is because kidney disease is a quiet disease

Kidney disease is known as a silent disease, which can be true in many kids as well. If a defect in the development of the kidneys is not detected in utero, then for many kids one of the first symptoms is protein in the urine. Dr. Scantlebury discusses how, once a child is born, it’s important to get them to a size where they can receive a transplant. Generally, this means that the length of the torso is 7 inches long, so that the surgeon is able to place an adult donor kidney. When it comes to transplants in children, they are almost always from a deceased adult donor, since children under 18 cannot consent to living donation. When it comes to the actual organ matching while on the transplant list (for both children and adults), Dr. Scantlebury highlights that there is no specific “number” that you are assigned to on the list. Instead, there are 6 DNA markers that each person has that are used to match donor to recipient. Every donor is different, so the shuffling of those at the top of the list will continue to rotate because everyone isn’t going to match the next available donor. Some key factors that go into remaining in good standing on the transplant list include making sure you are up-to-date on all of your medical and dental screenings, and getting any work done that is needed to ensure you as healthy and ready as possible if you are called up with a match.

When discussing overall health, one topic that usually comes up are vitamins and supplements. One of the most common ones is vitamin D supplements, which as it turns out, are incredibly important for not only kidney disease patients, but the overall population as well. Many people who don’t have kidney disease are vitamin D deficient and with low levels of it, you are unable to absorb calcium. I can become even more crucial patients (depending on your levels) to supplement vitamin D so that your body can absorb calcium, keep your bones healthy, and keeping your phosphorus levels low. .

If you have your own questions you’d like to have the doctor answer, tune in for our Live events on both Instagram and Facebook:

• IG Live @patientcitizens the first Wednesday of each month, 12:30pm EST
• Facebook Live www.facebook.com/patientcitizens the third Wednesday of each month, 12:30pm EST