National Kidney Foundation Innovation Fund Invests in Northernmost to Advance Next-Generation Kidney Preservation Technology

NEW YORK, Feb. 5, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- The National Kidney Foundation (NKF) Innovation Fund has made its first investment for 2025. Northernmost™ is a medical device company developing NoMo™ Kidney Pump. NKF will help fund development of Northernmost's new technology, a system designed to modernize the preservation and transport of donor kidneys for transplantation.

Currently, 71% of donor kidneys are preserved in static cold storage, a no-tech method that risks organ damage, limits safe storage time, and causes delayed graft function (DGF) and other adverse events. Perfusion machines circulate fluid through the kidney, optimizing preservation and providing real-time data on organ viability. But despite decades of clinical evidence demanding continuous perfusion, all the way from donor to recipient, today's machines are too large, unwieldy, and expensive to do the job routinely. With NoMo's small, simple, and smart design, Northernmost intends to eliminate ice coolers altogether.

This strategic investment aligns with NKF's commitment to advancing innovations that improve kidney transplantation outcomes, reduce organ discard rates, and expand access to life-saving transplants.

"The way donor kidneys are preserved and transported hasn't changed in decades, and too many viable organs are lost due to outdated methods," said Kevin Longino, CEO of the National Kidney Foundation and a kidney transplant recipient. "Northernmost's NoMo Kidney Pump offers a more advanced, portable, and efficient solution to improve transplant outcomes. By investing in this technology, the NKF Innovation Fund is helping to ensure that more kidneys reach patients in optimal condition, reducing waste and saving lives."

With nearly 90,000 people currently on the kidney transplant waitlist, improving how donor organs are handled is critical. Research indicates that adopting continuous perfusion systems like NoMo could reduce kidney discards by more than 50% and save tens of billions in healthcare costs over the next decade.

"NKF's support encourages and inspires us," said Northernmost CEO Ron Mills, a serial entrepreneur in machine preservation. "We can't wait to introduce NoMo to the transplantation community this summer and to obsolete static cold storage in the years ahead. Because every donor kidney deserves to be pumped."

About Kidney Disease
In the United States, 35 million adults are estimated to have kidney disease, also known as chronic kidney disease (CKD)—and approximately 90 percent don't know they have it. 1 in 3 adults in the U.S. are at risk for kidney disease. Risk factors for kidney disease include diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, obesity, and family history. People of Black or African American, Hispanic or Latino, American Indian or Alaska Native, Asian American, or Native Hawaiian or Other Pacific Islander descent are at increased risk for developing the disease. Black or African American people are more than four times as likely as White Americans to have kidney failure.

About the National Kidney Foundation
The National Kidney Foundation is revolutionizing the fight to save lives by eliminating preventable kidney disease, accelerating innovation for the dignity of the patient experience, and dismantling structural inequities in kidney care, dialysis and transplantation. For more information about NKF, visit www.kidney.org

About Northernmost
Northernmost Medical Devices, Inc., is a Canadian startup developing a machine to preserve and transport donor kidneys for transplant. Based in Edmonton, Alberta, the company is led by the people who designed, built, and commercialized today's market-dominant kidney transporter. For more information, visit northernmost.ca.

SOURCE National Kidney Foundation