After Simon Elmore’s kidney failed, he slipped into a deep and destructive depression. Unable to accept a life on dialysis, he drank excessively, ignored everybody’s advice, and wasted days in his dressing gown at home.

But after receiving a kidney in January, everything changed for Simon. He ditched the booze, started exercising, followed doctor’s orders, ate well, and dedicated himself to helping others.

Simon Elmore British kidney patient association.

“I didn’t handle my situation well at first, and I regret that,” said Simon, 40, of Overstone Close, Belper.

“That’s why I wanted to show people – either on dialysis or after a transplant – that there is always hope. You can be, and do, what you thought was never again possible,”

The dad-of-three daughters also dedicated time to achieving sporting success once again.

Simon, who lives with wife Amanda and stepson Oliver, added: “After the operation, I said to myself ‘I owe it to my donor to make the most of the kidney they gave me’. So I changed my ways overnight. I know that amazing person will be looking down on me, and I am determined to make them happy.”

The hard work is definitely paying off too.

After learning table tennis in April, Simon scooped two silver medals at the Transplant Sport Racket Event, in Widnes, the following month.

Later this month, Simon will be competing in six events – 10 pin bowling, archery, table tennis, lawn bowls, cricket ball throw, and relay – at the British National Transplant Games, in Newcastle.

The rules stipulate that participants cannot compete until six months after their transplant. On July 30, when the games start, it will be six months and eight days since Simon’s transplant.

He said: “I’m determined to win at least one gold medal at the games, and with my commitment and passion, I’m pretty confident that I’ll win some medals.”

If Simon achieves gold, he will earn a place at the World Transplant Games, in Argentina, starting on August 22 – exactly seven months after his transplant. However, the most important thing to Simon is helping others – and their families – with the group Voluntary Independent Renal Support (VIRS).

He said: “I want to raise awareness about the importance of organ donation with all this. It really does change people’s lives – gives them a new life. You don’t have to be dead to donate a kidney. You can also be a part of and see the effect this has in your lifetime.”

Simon said he would like to thank the following for donating to VIRS: Mr Wint, also his step-dad, of Dale Accountancy Service Ltd; Andy, of Specsavers, in Belper; CVS Ripley; Futures Homescape; Belper Nursing Cup; and Sam Moss from the Masons, Belper.

He added: “I’d like to say a special thanks to Ken Hagger, of South Normanton. His wife sadly had kidney disease and passed away, so has donated in memory of her.”

To find out more about VIRS visit: http://virs.co.uk/.

To learn more about Simon’s story, visit: http://www.britishtransplantgames.co.uk/case-study-simon-elmore.

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David J. Salant, a MED professor of medicine and of pathology and laboratory medicine, is BU’s Innovator of the Year. Photos by Esther Ro (COM’15)

Suggest to David Salant that his research must have taken a long time and you’ll hear a dry chuckle.

“How about 30 years?” Salant says.

Salant, a School of Medicine professor of medicine and of pathology and laboratory medicine and chief of the nephrology section at Boston Medical Center, was named the University’s Innovator of the Year July 14, honored for his work identifying an antigen implicated in an autoimmune form of kidney disease called membranous nephropathy. The discovery has the potential to change the lives of hundreds of thousands of patients.

The award, presented each year by the Office of Technology Development, recognizes a BU faculty member whose cutting-edge research has been brought to market and benefits society at large. Salant’s discovery has been licensed to Germany-based Euroimmun, which quickly developed tests that were approved by the Food and Drug Administration(FDA) last year. Salant says the tests will provide quicker, easier diagnosis and also help measure the response to treatment of the kidney disease.

“Dr. Salant serves as a role model for students and other physicians looking to transform patient care by turning their own discoveries into practical applications,” said Gloria Waters, BU vice president and associate provost for research, as she presented the award to Salant at Technology Development’s sixth annual Tech, Drugs, and Rock n’ Roll event.

Salant first encountered membranous nephropathy, which occurs when the immune system goes awry and produces antibodies that attack healthy kidneys, in the early 1970s, when working in a teaching hospital in his native South Africa. “The first patient I encountered was a man in his early- to mid-40s with a young family, a good job. This was a devastating illness to him,” Salant says. “He got progressively worse and ended up on dialysis. I was fascinated by the fact that this was an autoimmune disease that no one knew anything about.”

The achievement—for which Salant shares credit with longtime colleague Laurence H. Beck, Jr., a MED assistant professor of medicine—was identifying the antigen, a protein called PLA2R, that is targeted by the immune response in 70 percent to 80 percent of the cases of the disease.

In 1977, Salant arrived at the Medical Campus on a research fellowship to work in a nephrology lab. Working with animals that had the disease, his group found antibodies to an unknown protein antigen in the glomerulus, the filtering unit of the kidney. But the equivalent in human cases was never established. It would take 30 years and one unintentional development for Salant, working with Beck, to identify a similar antigen in humans.

“Generally one adds a reducing agent to the protein mixture that one assumes contains the antigen, in order to open or unfold the proteins,” Salant says. “It turns out that if one does that, PLA2R is not identified by the circulating antibodies.” In other words, their method of looking for the connection had prevented it from happening.

“We left out the reducing agent for reasons that had nothing to do with what we were looking for and…then saw the protein,” he says. “It was somewhat serendipitous.”

Vinit Nijhawan, Office of Technology Development managing director (left), and Salant.

It took the researchers another year to firmly identify PLA2R, with the help of a collaborator in France and scientists at the University of Louisville using mass spectrometry. Their results, published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 2009, generated interest from investigators around the world and a number of companies, leading to the connection with Euroimmun.

“The number of human autoimmune diseases in which the target antigen has been identified can probably be counted on one or maybe two hands,” Salant says.

Although membranous nephropathy is classified as a rare disease, it affects hundreds of thousands of people around the world, according to Salant. After diabetes, it is the most common cause of the set of kidney malfunctions known as nephrotic syndrome, and one out of four patients develops end-stage kidney failure requiring dialysis or a transplant.

The current method for detecting membranous nephropathy is a kidney biopsy. Euroimmun tests for PLA2R with a blood test known as an immunoassay. The FDA does not currently recommend that it replace the biopsy, but it at least gives doctors a second, less invasive option in confirming a diagnosis.

PLA2R can also be instrumental in monitoring the response to treatment for membranous nephropathy, Salant says. The disease is treated aggressively with immunosuppressive and chemotherapeutic drugs, much like a cancer would be, “and it is not a benign treatment,” he says. But until now gauging the progress of treatment has been difficult.

“If you can follow along with the treatment using the antibody levels and then stop treatment when the antibody levels fall to zero, then you know that the patient is in remission,” he says.

Beck and some of their European colleagues have even more recently identified a second antigen that accounts for about 5 percent of cases, Salant says. So is he going to find the antigen(s) for the remaining cases? “If I live long enough,” he says.

Several hundred people, from students and faculty to tech executives and venture capitalists, crowded into the George Sherman Union’s Metcalf Hall for the sixth annual Tech, Drugs, and Rock n’ Roll networking event, which also honored the winners of the Technology Development MAPP mobile app development contest.

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NSCN (I-M)’s Th. Muivah and Isak Chishi Swu (second and third from left) with former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh

July 19:NSCN (I-M) chairman Isak Chishi Swu is on dialysis at a Delhi hospital, government sources today said.

The octogenarian insurgent leader is said to have been diagnosed with urinary tract infection a few years ago. He came to India to undergo treatment in 2011 when he was issued a fresh Indian passport by authorities.

"It is the first time that he has been put on dialysis indicating that the kidneys are not functioning," said a source. "His condition is said to be critical but stable," the government source added.

As his condition remained critical, Q. Tuccu, a member of the outfit's collective leadership, has emerged as the front-runner to succeed him.

Tuccu, 75, who is from the Sumi community and hails from Khetoi village in Zunheboto district of Nagaland, has held several key portfolios in the group and is known to be a close associate of Swu.

To keep its flock together, the managers and think tank of the group would opt for a person from Nagaland as Swu's successor. Of the two top leaders of the outfit, Swu is from Chishilimi village in Zunheboto district while Muivah is from Ukhrul district in Manipur.

Apart from Tuccu, others from Nagaland who are in the top hierarchy of the rebel outfit are A.Z. Jami, Vikiye Awomi and Tongmath Wangnao. Sources said leaders of Naga civil organisations are in Delhi to see the ailing Naga leader. One source said Swu was almost in a coma, but another source said there was some improvement in his condition.

Sources in Delhi said Swu was admitted to Fortis Flight Lieutenant Ranjan Dhall Hospital in Vasant Kunj and was being treated by a team of nephrologists. However, no medical staff or Swu's attendants are speaking about his condition.

Delhi police personnel in plainclothes have been deployed for Swu's security.

A source from the NSCN (I-M) said Swu had been admitted to the ICU, but he refused to disclose details of his health condition. The NSCN (I-M) chairman who is also president of the "Government of the People's Republic of Nagalim" (GPRN) has not been keeping well for quite some time. He had a minor stroke a couple of years back in Bangkok.

The NSCN cadres across Nagalim (Naga-inhabited areas) today observed a fast and prayed for their chairman's quick recovery and also requested all churches to do the same.

A senior kilonser(minister) in the GPRN said Swu's condition is not good. "Please pray for him," he added.

The general secretary of the Council of Nagalim Churches, Reverend Seksimkasar, said Swu's condition had deteriorated in the last couple of days and asked people to pray for him. "Our chairman Isak Chishi Swu has not been feeling well for quite some days and is deteriorating. He is also advanced in age as well. Therefore, we appeal to all god-loving citizens to pray for him," he added.

The NSCN (I-M) has also requested all priests, pastors and leaders of the churches to organise fast and prayers.

Swu and general secretary of the outfit, Thuingaleng Muivah, have been the main persons engaged in dialogue with the Centre since 1997 when they signed a ceasefire.

The two joined the Naga National Council (NNC) in the early sixties. Swu was foreign secretary of the "Federal Government of Nagaland" and Muivah was general secretary of the NNC.

The two comrades along with "general" Thenousalie Keyho were the ones who were first to contact with Chinese leaders. They had also travelled far and wide in China and received Beijing's assistance to fight New Delhi.

They along with S.S. Khaplang, a Naga from Myanmar, formed the NSCN on January 31, 1980 after the NNC had signed an agreement with the Centre known as Shillong Accord in 1975. But the NSCN again split on April 30, 1988, and the NSCN (K), led by Khaplang, was formed.

The objective of the NSCN (I-M) was to establish a sovereign state by unifying all the Naga-inhabited areas in the Northeast and northern Myanmar which the organisation and the people of the area proposed as Nagalim. Unification of all Naga communities under one administration and liberating Nagalim from India is listed as one of the main objectives of the organisation.

In many areas, it runs a parallel government. There are four major "ministries" - defence, home, finance and foreign affairs. Moreover, there are five other "ministries" including education, information and publicity, forests and minerals, law and justice and religious affairs. The most prominent among the ministries is the "home ministry" ( kiloministry).

Over the years, the NSCN, led by Swu and Muivah, has tried to develop extensive linkages both within and outside India. The outfit has also opened up contacts with international organisations like the UN Human Rights Organisation in Geneva, Unrepresented Nations and People's organisation (UNPO) at the Hague and the UN Working Group on Indigenous People.

Since 1997, Swu along with Muivah have met many Prime Ministers, including P.V. Narasimha Rao, H.D. Deve Gowda, I.K. Gujral, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh and held talks in different places across the world, including Paris, Zurich, Osaka, New York, Geneva and Bangkok.

They also held 26 rounds of talks in New Delhi, the latest being held on July 16, 2014.

The room in the ICU - where the leader fighting for a sovereign state by unifying all the Naga-inhabited areas of the region is undergoing treatment - is overshadowed by the country's one of the ancient monuments, Qutub Minar, which is visible from the window.

Additional Reporting By our Delhi Bureau

...

NSCN (I-M)’s Th. Muivah and Isak Chishi Swu (second and third from left) with former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh

July 19:NSCN (I-M) chairman Isak Chishi Swu is on dialysis at a Delhi hospital, government sources today said.

The octogenarian insurgent leader is said to have been diagnosed with urinary tract infection a few years ago. He came to India to undergo treatment in 2011 when he was issued a fresh Indian passport by authorities.

"It is the first time that he has been put on dialysis indicating that the kidneys are not functioning," said a source. "His condition is said to be critical but stable," the government source added.

As his condition remained critical, Q. Tuccu, a member of the outfit's collective leadership, has emerged as the front-runner to succeed him.

Tuccu, 75, who is from the Sumi community and hails from Khetoi village in Zunheboto district of Nagaland, has held several key portfolios in the group and is known to be a close associate of Swu.

To keep its flock together, the managers and think tank of the group would opt for a person from Nagaland as Swu's successor. Of the two top leaders of the outfit, Swu is from Chishilimi village in Zunheboto district while Muivah is from Ukhrul district in Manipur.

Apart from Tuccu, others from Nagaland who are in the top hierarchy of the rebel outfit are A.Z. Jami, Vikiye Awomi and Tongmath Wangnao. Sources said leaders of Naga civil organisations are in Delhi to see the ailing Naga leader. One source said Swu was almost in a coma, but another source said there was some improvement in his condition.

Sources in Delhi said Swu was admitted to Fortis Flight Lieutenant Ranjan Dhall Hospital in Vasant Kunj and was being treated by a team of nephrologists. However, no medical staff or Swu's attendants are speaking about his condition.

Delhi police personnel in plainclothes have been deployed for Swu's security.

A source from the NSCN (I-M) said Swu had been admitted to the ICU, but he refused to disclose details of his health condition. The NSCN (I-M) chairman who is also president of the "Government of the People's Republic of Nagalim" (GPRN) has not been keeping well for quite some time. He had a minor stroke a couple of years back in Bangkok.

The NSCN cadres across Nagalim (Naga-inhabited areas) today observed a fast and prayed for their chairman's quick recovery and also requested all churches to do the same.

A senior kilonser(minister) in the GPRN said Swu's condition is not good. "Please pray for him," he added.

The general secretary of the Council of Nagalim Churches, Reverend Seksimkasar, said Swu's condition had deteriorated in the last couple of days and asked people to pray for him. "Our chairman Isak Chishi Swu has not been feeling well for quite some days and is deteriorating. He is also advanced in age as well. Therefore, we appeal to all god-loving citizens to pray for him," he added.

The NSCN (I-M) has also requested all priests, pastors and leaders of the churches to organise fast and prayers.

Swu and general secretary of the outfit, Thuingaleng Muivah, have been the main persons engaged in dialogue with the Centre since 1997 when they signed a ceasefire.

The two joined the Naga National Council (NNC) in the early sixties. Swu was foreign secretary of the "Federal Government of Nagaland" and Muivah was general secretary of the NNC.

The two comrades along with "general" Thenousalie Keyho were the ones who were first to contact with Chinese leaders. They had also travelled far and wide in China and received Beijing's assistance to fight New Delhi.

They along with S.S. Khaplang, a Naga from Myanmar, formed the NSCN on January 31, 1980 after the NNC had signed an agreement with the Centre known as Shillong Accord in 1975. But the NSCN again split on April 30, 1988, and the NSCN (K), led by Khaplang, was formed.

The objective of the NSCN (I-M) was to establish a sovereign state by unifying all the Naga-inhabited areas in the Northeast and northern Myanmar which the organisation and the people of the area proposed as Nagalim. Unification of all Naga communities under one administration and liberating Nagalim from India is listed as one of the main objectives of the organisation.

In many areas, it runs a parallel government. There are four major "ministries" - defence, home, finance and foreign affairs. Moreover, there are five other "ministries" including education, information and publicity, forests and minerals, law and justice and religious affairs. The most prominent among the ministries is the "home ministry" ( kiloministry).

Over the years, the NSCN, led by Swu and Muivah, has tried to develop extensive linkages both within and outside India. The outfit has also opened up contacts with international organisations like the UN Human Rights Organisation in Geneva, Unrepresented Nations and People's organisation (UNPO) at the Hague and the UN Working Group on Indigenous People.

Since 1997, Swu along with Muivah have met many Prime Ministers, including P.V. Narasimha Rao, H.D. Deve Gowda, I.K. Gujral, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Manmohan Singh and held talks in different places across the world, including Paris, Zurich, Osaka, New York, Geneva and Bangkok.

They also held 26 rounds of talks in New Delhi, the latest being held on July 16, 2014.

The room in the ICU - where the leader fighting for a sovereign state by unifying all the Naga-inhabited areas of the region is undergoing treatment - is overshadowed by the country's one of the ancient monuments, Qutub Minar, which is visible from the window.

Additional Reporting By our Delhi Bureau

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