John K Maesaka
NYU Winthrop Hospital, USA
Biography
John K Maesaka was born in Hawaii, received degrees from Harvard College and Boston University School of Medicine, did his medical residencies at Barnes-Jewish Hospital at Washington University In St. Louis and Mount Sinai Hospital in New York and renal fellowship at Mount Sinai Hospital. His interest-driven decision to spend 5 years exclusively in the renal physiology laboratory at Mount Sinai Hospital as a renal fellow and member of the faculty proved to be the best investment he made to pursue an academic career in medicine. He was involved in developing colorimetric methods for the determination of uric acid and phosphorus in blood and urine that were applied to studying the transport characteristics of both electrolytes by renal micropuncture techniques in rat kidney. He developed several bioassays to demonstrate the presence of a natriuretic factor in the blood of patients with renal salt wasting and Alzheimer’s disease and more recently identified the elusive natriuretic factor after more than a 25-year pursuit.