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Bucktown Trainer Helps Kidney Transplant Patients Get Fit in Pilot Study

By Alisa Hauser | October 15, 2014 5:45am
 Bucktown's GhFitlab is seeking to change the way patients recover from kidney transplant surgeries by adding a resistance and exercise training protocol. After a successful small trial, the group has gotten the green light to start a much larger clinical trial and is seeking participation from 150 kidney transplant patients.
GhFitlab Study Launches Large Scale Clinical Trial
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BUCKTOWN — After having a kidney transplant, John Galvan still didn't feel right, so his doctor referred him to a Bucktown personal trainer — and Galvan couldn't be happier.

Greg Hachaj, co-owner of GhFitLab at 1730 N. Western Ave., helped Galvan, 54, regain his energy and strength during a pilot study to determine if exercise and resistance training could help post-op kidney transplant patients who were morbidly obese.

"It's really worked for me," said Galvan, of Lockport, of his twice-weekly workouts.

Alisa Hauser says the initial test was overwhelmingly successful:

Galvan began working with Hachaj in May 2012. They met up because he didn't feel well after his transplant earlier that year.

"I am blessed that I had a private [kidney] donor. [But] I didn't want to seem like I was ungrateful because I was given a new lease on life but I didn't feel better," Galvan said of the weeks following his kidney transplant, when he was suffering from pain and exhaustion.

After airing his complaints to his doctor, Enrico Benedetti, the chairman of University of Illinois at Chicago's Department of Surgery, Benedetti suggested Galvan join a small clinical pilot study with GhFitlab.

During the year-long pilot study, where supervised workouts took place at the UIC Medical Center, Galvan and all of the GhfitLab participants — nine in total — were compared with a control group of eight patients who were not working with GhFitlab.

Those who were part of the Ghfitlab program saw measurable gains in improved kidney function, muscle mass and strength.

Benedetti called the results "remarkable."

"It's not about lifting weights. They don't rush you and target each muscle. Here you go slow," said Galvan, who has gradually returned to work as a self-employed IT project manager. 

Based on the results of the pilot study, a larger-scale study was launched last week to see if the findings can be replicated.

Though the broader study will cost $1.5 million, almost $350,000 has already been raised to help gauge the impact of exercise on 150 post-op kidney transplant patients who receive transplants at UIC Hospital as well as Northwestern Memorial Hospital, according to Ghfitlab's co-owner Mark Grazman.

Even after receiving a transplant, many patients still consider themselves disabled, as they were when they were on dialysis, and have difficulty returning to a healthy lifestyle, Benedetti said. Only one-quarter of them engage in physical exercise, he said.

Though small in scale with just 17 patients, employment rates of those who participated in the pilot study were significantly higher, with seven of nine of those in the Ghfitlab program returning to jobs after transplant surgery as compared to one of eight in the control group. 

Benedetti said a larger randomized group of 150 post-op patients could be "sufficient in scale to ultimately change national policy and dramatically improve the lives of tens of thousands of transplant recipients each year."

The expanded trial has garnered financial support from Gift of Hope, an organ procurement agency serving Illinois and Indiana, as well as the University of Illinois Department of Surgery Foundation, the Pasquinelli Family Foundation and the Alvin H. Baum Family Fund.

For the expanded study, Benedetti also brought on Dr. Lorenzo Gallon from Northwestern University's Feinberg School of Medicine to recruit patients, including those who are not obese.

Since doctors at UIC and Northwestern Memorial Hospital collectively perform about 350 kidney transplants each year, it is unknown how long it will take to recruit the 150 patients needed for the study, Grazman said.

When his participation in the year-long pilot study ended last year, Galvan said decided to become a private client at Hachaj's fitness studio.

For Galvan, being physically healthier means he can do things like put up Halloween decorations, mow the lawn and go on vacation with his wife.

During the three years he was receiving in-home dialysis for 11 hours daily prior to his 2012 surgery, Galvan said he had to sleep in a separate bedroom from his wife because the incessant beeping sounds coming from the machines next to their bed were keeping her awake.

After the transplant and participating in the exercise program, they went to Paris.

"I had to do a lot of walking and would not have been able to do that before. Everyone knows happy wife, happy life," Galvan said.

Beyond Galvan's story, and the success from the pilot study, Grazman said the goal is to replicate a health and fitness protocol for post-op kidney patients on a larger level.

"With 90,000 people on a waiting list to get a kidney, and only 15 percent of those will get a kidney, we have an obligation to those that donate a kidney and to those who receive one to make sure the transplant is as successful as possible," Grazman said.

For more information about the study, visit ghfitlab.com/results/clinical-trials.

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