Q&A: ‘Always learning’ nephrologist embraces internet as education platform
With more than 15,000 followers and 18,000 posts on X and a podcast called “Channel Your Enthusiasm” reviewing a classic text about acid-base and electrolyte disorders, Roger Rodby, MD, has embraced internet education.
Rodby serves as a community leader for the American Society of Nephrology online open community and is a member of the social media advisory group for the American Journal of Kidney Diseases. In his biography on X, he describes himself as “always learning.”
“Twitter, or X, is great for teaching,” Rodby told Healio. “We share cases, we share opinions, we share articles, and it fits me well.”
The National Kidney Foundation recently honored Rodby, a professor of medicine in the nephrology division at Rush University Medical Center, with the 2025 Donald W. Seldin Award, “established to recognize excellence in clinical nephrology in the tradition of one of the foremost teachers and researchers in the field,” according to an organization press release.
“I have spent my professional life trying to improve my teaching skills, influence others to be inquisitive, think outside the box and to never be intellectually complacent. The latter part of my career has covered so many new venues that has allowed me to reach more people,” Rodby said in the release.
Rodby talked with Healio about what led him to nephrology, the enduring humor of Seinfeld, and the power of a social media platform to connect educators across generations.
Healio: What was the defining moment that led you to your field?
Rodby: I always liked the analytical part of medicine. When I was first introduced to internal medicine as a medical student, I knew exactly which medicine pathway I would enter. Then in my later years in medical school, I became interested in endocrinology and nephrology, which are both kind of cerebral, analytical-pathway-oriented specialties.
As a resident I matched in New Jersey at Rutgers University. During my first month there, I was put on an elective with nephrology working with Richard A. Sherman, MD. Richard was just so smart, and I loved the way he looked at things. I knew then I was going to be a nephrologist. Most people aren’t lucky enough to find something that early in their career. I knew from that point that endocrine was out, and nephrology was in. There was no turning back.
Healio: What area of research in nephrology interests you most right now?
Rodby: We do a lot of different things in nephrology, from physiology to dialysis and kidney failure, and some rare diseases. What’s been interesting is the explosion of medications that have changed the face of and the approach to glomerulonephritis.
It started, I suppose, in oncology with all the biologics and understanding the pathways. That field has completely erupted — from trying to kill every cell instead of the person, to targeting specific cancer cells. The same thing happened with rheumatology, where you would destroy the immune system and hopefully the patient wouldn’t have joint pain anymore.
In nephrology, a lot of those drugs have the same kind of effects. In the last decade, we have changed our approach to treating these diseases with much less toxic drugs. I’m at Rush University, which has a long history of glomerulonephritis research; some of the earliest renal biopsies were done at Rush.
We have a biopsy conference that is Zoomed every couple of weeks and followed internationally. These conferences are recorded, and we now have over 100 on our YouTube channel. Glomerulonephritis is a big part of what we do in academic medicine, and it has been exciting to see it evolve. Nephrology was stagnant for a while. But in the last decade, disease understandings and therapeutic options have exploded. It parallels the technology that changed the fields of oncology and rheumatology and probably every field, for that matter.
Healio: Following up on that, have you ever witnessed history in the making?
Rodby: When I first started my training in 1985, we were experiencing a new paradigm in treating kidney disease with renin-angiotensin system inhibition. There were animal models that showed blocking this pathway can change the outcome of kidney failure independently of whatever else was driving that kidney disease’s outcome.
I was fortunate to be at Rush, where we did one of the first studies with one of the first drugs in that field — captopril. My boss at the time, Edmund J. Lewis, MD, was the principal investigator of a study that looked at captopril and type 1 diabetes. The researchers translated the finding in animal models that captopril can markedly slow the progression of renal disease, and then we went ahead and did a study with another renin-angiotensin system inhibitor, irbesartan for type 2 diabetes. It was a huge paradigm shift because we were no longer just sitting by and watching people’s kidney failure. We started to play an active role in stopping what diabetes (and now multiple other kidney diseases) does to the kidneys. These studies defined renoprotection. I just happened to land here and was lucky to be part of that.
Healio: Where do you think we’re going in the next 5 to10 years in kidney care?
Rodby: That’s a good question because dialysis is an incredible technology, but it has improved only a little bit in the last 20 years. There’s only so much you can do with a machine. It’s great we can replace the kidney with dialysis, but there is not a lot that has changed.
The future for people with kidney failure is renal transplantation, and it’s hard to get people to donate. There are many more people on the transplant list than there are donors. What’s really exciting is xenotransplantation. It has a long way to go with the kidney, but that could be a game changer — a really big one.
Healio: In endocrinology, we now have a wearable artificial pancreas. Do you think we’ll get there with kidney, something small and wearable?
Rodby: That’s a debate we’re having: Is the future a small, wearable kidney? Or is the future a pig kidney? Every year, the National Kidney Foundation of Illinois has debates among five training programs in Chicago. Our debate topic this year is artificial kidney vs. pig kidney. I think there will be a wearable kidney, but if xenotransplants work, I’m not sure you’ll need it. I wouldn’t bet against biologic technology. It will be interesting to see where that goes.
Healio: If you weren’t a nephrologist, what would you be doing?
Rodby: Much like George Costanza [the Seinfeld character portrayed by Jason Alexander], I would be a marine biologist [Editor’s note: See http://imdb.com/title/tt0697729/]. I loved biology growing up. I spent my childhood catching butterflies. I used to scuba dive a lot. I would have just loved to be some kind of biologist, and the ocean would have been a great place to do it.
Healio: Would you tell me a bit about your following on X and how you got into social media?
Rodby: One of my former fellows knew I was involved in the American Society of Nephrology community blog board and told me it was time to join Twitter — it’s now called X — that there were people there involved in education. I posted snippets of information, and one thing led to another, and people just started following me.
Because of the politics of what’s going on with Elon Musk, a lot of people have left the platform. I think the biggest players have just abandoned Twitter. I have felt that while my politics are absolutely in line with leaving, what I can do on Twitter is mostly education. Twitter, or X, is great for teaching. We share cases, we share opinions, we share articles, and it fits me well. I still think I’ll reach a lot more people if I stay than if I go over to another platform.
A funny story: Mr. Benner, my biology teacher, was the one high school teacher that really showed passion in his teaching, and that was the reason I went into science in college.
About 20 years ago, I sent him a letter: “Hey, I want you to know that you were the reason I went into science, and I’ve done OK.” It’s important to tell the people in your life that they meant something to you. I never heard from him.
Yesterday, out of the clear blue, he wrote back to a tweet I posted in X. He has probably been following me all along. He follows 20 people and has four followers. Now he has five because I started following him. But there he was with his picture, my high school biology teacher as a totally recognizable 90-year-old man, who in his words “still has his kidneys.”
For more information:
Roger Rodby, MD, can be reached at roger_a_rodby@rush.edu or on X @NephRodby.
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