Karoline Korsholm Jeppesen - PhD Scholarship 2025
Project summary:
Kidney injury in cardiac arrest and cardiogenic shock
Patients who suffer a cardiac arrest or a large heart attack are at risk of kidney injury and may experience severe circulatory failure, sometimes requiring support from a mechanical heart pump. We hypothesize that different types of mechanical heart pumps may themselves contribute to kidney damage. We will study both patient groups (with cardiac arrest or heart attack) and conduct experiments in a pig model.
Project Title
Kidney injury in cardiac arrest and cardiogenic shock
Background
The Danish DanGer Shock trial showed that the artificial heart pump, Impella, could reduce mortality in a specific group of patients with a large heart attack and severely reduced heart pump function, however, this came with an increased risk of kidney injury requiring dialysis.
Aim
The aim of the PhD study is to investigate mechanisms leading to acute kidney injury in patients with severely reduced heart pump function treated with different mechanical heart pump strategies, and the immediate and long-term impact on the kidney function.
Methods
A previous patient cohort with shock and large heart attack admitted at two Danish heart centers from 2010-2017 will be expanded with patients admitted from 2018-2023. In this cohort, kidney injury will be evaluated. In a porcine model, we will cause heart attack and cardiac arrest in 45 pigs, and randomize to treatment with one of three mechanical heart pumps. We will then investigate the effects on the kidneys.
Preliminary results
A sub-study of a randomized clinical trial of patients with cardiac arrest outside a hospital showed that patients who developed acute kidney injury had a worse 1-year survival compared to patients without acute kidney injury irrespective of the circumstance of cardiac arrest.
Karoline Korsholm Jeppesen
- MD
- University of Southern Denmark, Department of Clinical Research
Main supervisor:
Clinial Professor Jacob Eifer Møller, Department of Cardiology, Odense University Hospital & Department of Cardiology, Copenhagen University Hospital, Rigshospitalet
Co-supervisors:
Professor Hanne Berg Ravn, Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care, Odense University Hospital
Ann Bøcher Secher Banke, Associate Professor, Department of Cardiology, Odense University Hospital
Professor Christian Hassager, Department of Cardiology, Copenhagen University Hospital, Rigshospitalet
Collaborators:
Henrik Schmidt, MD, Associate Professor, Department of Anesthesiology and Intensive Care, Odense University Hospital
Ole Helgestad, MD, PhD, Department of Cardiology, Odense University Hospital
Professor Jens Flensted Lassen, Department of Cardiology, Odense University Hospital