This story appeared in the Internal Medicine Department’s 2022 Biennial Report, which was published earlier this year.
Nebraska Medicine has opened a dedicated glomerulonephritis (GN) clinic under the direction of Prasanth Ravipati, MD, who specializes in the diagnosis and management of glomerular diseases.
Located on the med center’s Omaha campus, the half-day clinic provides weekly slots for patients with such rare and complex diseases that can lead to end-stage kidney disease, other serious morbidity or death.
“The goal is to let other providers and patients know there is a place in Nebraska for additional GN resources,” said Dr. Ravipati, assistant professor in the UNMC Department of Internal Medicine’s Division of Nephrology. “We can help manage these patients and provide access to clinical trials for cutting-edge treatments.”
A complex syndrome encompassing a variety of individual disorders, GN is an inflammation of the glomeruli-small blood vessels in the kidney that help filter blood and remove excess fluids. If damaged, the kidneys stop working properly, resulting in kidney failure.
Following residency at UNMC, Dr. Ravipati did his fellowship training in nephrology and then glomerular disease and vasculitis at the University of Minnesota before returning to the med center in 2021.
Dr. Ravipati said UNMC will collaborate with the University of Minnesota in building a GN registry that will give patients increased access to clinical trials for new drugs. The registry also will assist researchers in investigating GN’s underlying conditions, as well as the course of the disease.
“It’s very heterogeneous in the way people are impacted,” Dr. Ravipati said. “We’re fortunate to have seen an increase in research and potential new treatments in the past several years that has greatly benefited GN patients.”