内容摘要：Fast furniture’s association with cheaper materials, excessive packaging and frequent replacement clashes with consumers’ growing interest in minimizing our lasting impact on the planet.

Fast furniture’s association with cheaper materials, excessive packaging and frequent replacement clashes with consumers’ growing interest in minimizing our lasting impact on the planet.

transplanted in January. A U.S. clinical trial is about to begin.Nearly three weeks after the kidney surgery the Chinese patient “is very well” and the pig kidney likewise is functioning very well, Dr. Lin Wang of Xijing Hospital of the Fourth Military Medical University in Xi’an told reporters in a briefing this week.

Wang, part of the hospital’s xenotransplant team, said the kidney recipient remains in the hospital for testing. Chinese media have reported she is a 69-year-old woman diagnosed with kidney failure eight years ago.But Wang pointed to a potential next step in xenotransplantation — learning to transplant pig livers. His team reported Wednesday in the journal Nature that a pig liver transplanted into a brain-dead person survived for 10 days, with no early signs of rejection. He said the pig liver produced bile and albumin — important for basic organ function — although not as much as human livers do.The liver is a complex challenge because of its varied jobs, including removing waste, breaking down nutrients and medicines, fighting infection, storing iron and regulating blood clotting.

“We do find that it could function a little bit in a human being,” Wang said. He speculated that would be enough to help support a failing human liver.In the U.S. last year, surgeons at the University of Pennsylvania attempted that sort of “bridge” support

to a brain-dead human body to filter blood, much like dialysis for failing kidneys. U.S. pig developer eGenesis is studying that approach.

In China, Wang’s team didn’t remove the deceased person’s own liver, instead implanting the pig liver near it.At first, some doctors resisted the effort, figuring they knew best, Williams said, but there’s much less pushback now that the collaborative has proven its value.

MemorialCare Miller Children’s & Women’s Hospital Long Beach started participating around 2010. The collaborative helps “vet through all the research that’s out there,” said Shari Kelly, executive director of perinatal services. “It’s just so important to really understand how we as health care providers can make a difference.”For example, if a woman loses a certain amount of blood after a vaginal delivery, “we know to activate what we call here a ‘code crimson,’ which brings blood to the bedside,” Kelly said. “We can act fast and stop any potential hemorrhage.”

She said the collaborative has also helped reduce racial inequities — bringing down the rate of cesarean sections among Black moms, for example.In July, U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services proposed a similar initiative to California’s, focused on the quality of maternal care nationwide: the first baseline health and safety requirements for maternal emergency and obstetric services in hospitals.