Message from the Music Program Director

We all know that music is a science and a language. It is both mathematical and historical. It brings much good and indeed it brings LIFE.

Chronic kidney disease prevalence in the US is 15%. The awareness of kidney disease among people in this population is 10%.

The US has the highest rate of new cases of kidney failure in the world, and over a third of these cases have never been evaluated by a kidney doctor before this life changing event.

Diabetes (high blood glucose) and  hypertension (high blood pressure) remain the two most common causes of kidney failure.

According to 2018 guidelines, almost half of Americans (nearly 46%) are considered to have high blood pressure and Approximately 84 million American adults—more than 1 out of 3—have prediabetes which is a serious health condition where blood sugar levels are higher than normal, but not high enough yet to be diagnosed as type 2 diabetes.

Why are so many people unaware that they have kidney disease until it’s too late? 

It’s because kidney disease is silent until the kidneys begin to fail. Even though kidney disease is silent, it doesn’t mean that we should stay silent too.

Given music’s effects on human body physiologically and mentally we highly can affect patients’ quality of life and treatment choices like hypertension management.

 In this program, we educate our community to fight kidney disease with lifestyle modifications and increase the knowledge of the supportive mental and physical effects of music. With proper diet, exercise, blood pressure and blood glucose control, plus the wholesome benefits of music, we can slow down the advancement of this silent progressive disease. We hope to add many more years to the lives of our patients without the need for dialysis or kidney transplant.

Preview our Music Program Event from April 2018 here: 

Learn how you can support the Clinical Music Program by visiting giving.ucla.edu/kidney.

Program Director

NOBAKHT

Niloofar Nobakht, MD, FASN

Director, Clinical Music Program

Director, Kidney & Hypertension Complications Program

Associate Director, Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD) Program
Assistant Clinical Professor, UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine

Specialty: Hypertension, Diabetic Kidney Disease, Polycystic Kidney Disease, Living Kidney Donors, Chronic Kidney Disease, Kidney Stones, Urinary Tract Infection, Dialysis, Fabry's Disease, Alport Syndrome and Clinical Research

Involvement: Clinical Trials of Diabetes Mellitus, Hypertension and Polycystic Kidney Disease since 2003.

Contact: (310) 794-5023