Kidney Compass: Navigating Clinical Trials

At the European Renal Association (ERA) Congress in Glasgow, Scotland, results from the TURING trial offered long-awaited evidence that rituximab can meaningfully reduce relapse rates in adults with minimal change disease (MCD) and focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS).
These conditions have been historically managed with prolonged, high-dose corticosteroid courses, carrying a substantial burden of adverse effects. In this episode of Kidney Compass, host Brendon Neuen, MBBS, PhD, spoke with Lisa Willcocks, MBBChir, MRCP, PhD, a consultant nephrologist who leads the primary glomerular disease service at Addenbrooke's Hospital in Cambridge, United Kingdom, about the trial she presented as a late-breaking clinical result at the congress.
Read more: https://www.hcplive.com/view/kidney-compass-turing-trial-rituximab-relapse-risk-mcd-fsgs

Hosts Brendon Neuen, MBBS, PhD, and Shikha Wadhwani, MD, MS, welcome Dana Rizk, MD, professor of medicine in the Division of Nephrology at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. Rizk walks through the 24-month eGFR and safety findings from the phase 3 VISIONARY trial of sibeprenlimab (Voyxact) in IgA nephropathy (IgAN) in the lastest episode of Kidney Compass.

At the World Congress of Nephrology 2026 in Yokohama, Japan, growing attention is being paid not just to whether therapies improve outcomes in chronic kidney disease, but how they work at a mechanistic level.
In this episode of Kidney Compass, host Brendon Neuen, MBBS, PhD, spoke with David Cherney, MD, PhD, about the REMODEL trial, a mechanistic study designed to better understand the kidney-protective effects of semaglutide in patients with type 2 diabetes and chronic kidney disease.
0:00:00 – Episode intro & guest setup
0:00:54 – What is REMODEL & link to FLOW
0:01:21 – Design, outcomes & mechanistic readouts of REMODEL
0:04:30 – Additive effects with SGLT2 inhibitors
0:07:17 – Perirenal fat, venous pressure & “toxic adiposity”
0:10:28 – Relevance to non‑diabetic CKD & SMART trial link
0:13:20 – Clinical messaging & patient communication
https://www.hcplive.com/view/kidney-compass-remodel-trial-provides-mechanistic-rationale-for-semaglutide-in-ckd

Iron deficiency is increasingly recognized as a clinically meaningful yet underexplored contributor to morbidity in kidney disease, extending beyond its traditional association with anemia. In populations such as kidney transplant recipients, where graft function may be stable, many patients continue to experience impaired physical function, reduced quality of life, and lingering fatigue.
As evidence from other fields, particularly cardiology, has begun to demonstrate the benefits of intravenous iron on functional outcomes independent of hemoglobin, questions are emerging about whether similar strategies could improve how patients with kidney disease feel and function, not just how they measure on laboratory parameters.
In this episode of Kidney Compass recorded on-site at World Congress of Nephrology in Yokohama, Japan, hosts Shikha Wadhwani, MD, MS, and Brendon Neuen, MBBS, PhD, spoke with Martin de Borst, MD, PhD, about his investigator-initiated randomized trial of intravenous iron in kidney transplant recipients.
0:00:00 – Episode intro & topic framing
0:01:11 – Rationale & observational signals
0:03:03 – Choice of primary endpoint (6‑minute walk)
0:04:35 – Trial design & blinding details
0:05:11 – Inclusion criteria & population profile
0:07:48 – Dosing regimen & primary outcome result
0:09:03 – Secondary outcomes & “fixed labs, not patients”
0:12:32 – Lessons learned & future trial directions
https://www.hcplive.com/view/kidney-compass-iv-iron-and-functional-outcomes-in-kidney-transplant-recipients

The treatment landscape for IgA nephropathy (IgAN) continues to evolve at a rapid pace, and new data presented at the World Congress of Nephrology (WCN) in Yokohama, Japan, suggest a potential shift in how clinicians approach disease modification in high-risk patients.
In this episode of Kidney Compass, hosts Shikha Wadhwani, MD, MS, and Brendon Neuen, MBBS, PhD, spoke with Vlado Perkovic, MBBS, PhD, about newly presented 2-year eGFR slope data from the phase 3 APPLAUSE-IgAN trial evaluating iptacopan.
0:00:00 – Episode intro & trial topic
0:00:52 – Overview of APPLAUSE trial & headline efficacy
0:02:40 – Hard outcome composite & safety profile
0:04:21 – Positioning iptacopan in guidelines & background therapy
0:05:10 – Consistency across subgroups & need for biomarkers
0:07:37 – Acute vs chronic eGFR slope with immunologic therapies
0:11:29 – Rationale for combination immunologic therapy
0:13:01 – Magnitude of effect, residual risk & early diagnosis
https://www.hcplive.com/view/kidney-compass-new-2-year-applause-igan-data-for-iptacopan-at-wcn-2026