Article - April 21, 2008 - El Paso Times

Sierra Medical to offer care for kidney patients

By Diana Washington Valdez

Patients who are candidates for a kidney transplant will be able to receive care before and after their surgery at the Sierra Medical Center Transplant Clinic.

The new clinic is the result of an agreement between Sierra and the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

Under the arrangement, kidney transplant patients will receive care supervised by nephrologists at Sierra Medical Center before and after transplant surgery.

UT Southwestern doctors with the UT Southwestern Kidney and Pancreas Transplantation Program will perform the actual transplants in Dallas.

"The first kidney transplant in Texas was performed in 1964 by a UT Southwestern surgeon," said Sergio Enriquez, spokesman for Sierra Medical. "Over the past 40 years, UT Southwestern physicians have pioneered many innovations in transplantation care that have become widely used throughout the nation."

He also said the program is nationally recognized and staffed by some of the best doctors in the field.

Sierra Medical ended kidney transplants in El Paso last year after losing its transplant surgeon. At the time, Sierra had about 80 patients on a waiting list for a kidney.

No one is performing kidney transplants in El Paso.

Manuel Corral, 39, a kidney patient, has been on the organ transplant waiting list for more than two years. He began with the former program at Sierra and hopes to undergo a transplant in Dallas soon.

"I was diagnosed with renal failure due to hypertension and diabetes, and I am on dialysis once a week for four hours," Corral said. "This program is a big help for me and the rest of the patients. I understand that UT Southwestern will pick up a lot of the costs involved, which is great for people like me who are on disability and don't have a lot of money."

In January, Las Palmas Medical Center announced it was starting a kidney transplant program with the same surgeon who used to be with Sierra. However, the process could take six or more months to complete.

Dr. Fernando Raudales, a nephrologist in El Paso, said Sierra's new arrangement is good news for kidney patients in need of a transplant.

"Patient care is our top priority, and the structure of this arrangement is designed with emphasis on patient convenience for the potentially life-saving treatment," he said."We are providing kidney transplant patients with local care, while also providing access to some of the best kidney transplant surgeons in the United States.

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