World Kidney Day 2022 – Kidney Health for All   Bridge the knowledge gap to better kidney care |10 March 2022

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is common and harmful: 1 out of 10 adult people worldwide have it, and if left untreated it can be deadly. While early detection allows for disease care and management to help prevent morbidity and mortality, and improve cost effectiveness and sustainability, kidney disease related mortality continues to increase yearly and is projected to be the fifth leading cause of death by 2040.

A persistent and ongoing CKD knowledge gap exists, one that is demonstrable at all levels of healthcare;

The community – Obstacles to better kidney health understanding include the complex nature of kidney disease information, low baseline awareness, limited health literacy, limited availability of CKD information, and lack of readiness to learn.

The healthcare worker – Another barrier to overcome in order to ensure greater awareness is a more focused education of physicians, as they are in charge of the patients’ medical condition.

This knowledge gap is stifling the fight against kidney disease, and increasing the inherent associated mortality.

This world kidney day, AMSA Renal Care in association with the Ministry of Health, calls for everyone in Seychelles to not only be aware of the disease, but to actively know what their own kidney health measures are. Akin to the health ministry’s motto ‘My health my responsibility’, Amsa Renal Care urges the public to take responsibility of their kidney health and be more aware of their health parameters like, what their blood pressure is, how is their sugar control, avoid smoking and heavy alcohol consumption, drink enough water (8 glasses per day) and know what the treatment objectives are and check with their physician if the treatment given to them are safe for their kidneys.

Kidney health awareness is a cause that involves all of us in the kidney community worldwide — physicians, scientists, nurses and other health-care providers, patients, administrators, health-policy experts, government officials, nephrology organisations, and foundations. All need to be aware of the ways in which more attention can be given to the kidney health in the setting of government policies that can lead to major benefits both to patients and to health-care budgets.

Moreover, Amsa Renal Care wishes to:

1. Encourage general public to adopt healthy diet and lifestyles (access to clean water, exercise, healthy diet, tobacco control, and climate change prevention) to maintain good kidney health, preserve kidney function longer in those with CKD, and increase overall general awareness of the importance of kidneys.

2. Extend kidney patient education (including practical advice on diet and lifestyle) to empower patients, their care-partners, and their support systems to achieve the health outcomes and life goals that are meaningful and important to those with kidney failure.

3. Recognise patients’ and caregivers’ right to be able to assess, understand and use health information related to CKD.

4. Encourage and support primary care physicians to improve their recognition and management of patients with CKD across its entire spectrum from prevention and early detection of CKD to its secondary and tertiary prevention and kidney failure care

Amsa renal care acknowledges the fact that the Ministry of Health has taken kidney health as a priority and many measures have been put in place to bridge the gap in renal care like outsourcing of dialysis services, integrate CKD and kidney failure prevention into national non-communicable disease programmes for comprehensive and integrated services, which are essential in improving the early detection and tracking of kidney care at country level. As a result, to this day the nephrology service is one of the best services at the Seychelles Hospital.

Since its inception in 2015, Amsa Renal Care has provided quality care in dialysis and managed to keep the patient mortality rate in check, which is now comparable to the best in the world. In order to cater to the ever growing needs, Amsa Renal Care expanded its operations to include another 15 dialysis stations in 2019. During the current ongoing pandemic, Amsa Renal Care managed to continue its services despite the challenges and made sure that the patients’ health is not compromised. Measures like starting two standalone dialysis stations at the Family Hospital, dedicated shift for positive patients with mild symptoms, implementing Covid-19 appropriate measures like level 3 PPE, intermittent sanitation and disinfection of patient surroundings. Even the outpatient services were continued with tele-consultations, despite it being outside our contractual obligations.

Amsa Renal Care Seychelles celebrates the world kidney day every year since 2015 by conducting screening programmes, walks to raise awareness about kidney health, educational sessions with patients and health care workers. The activities for this year have been curtailed due to the ongoing pandemic. But Amsa Renal Care wouldn't like to miss this opportunity to be a part of this global event. The week-long event started with a patient awareness programme on March 8 where pre-dialysis patients were counselled about their health needs and queries were addressed. This was followed by a public health awareness talk on SBC radio yesterday (March 9) and today (March 10).

“On March 10, there will be distribution of a food diary to the dialysis patients and a blood donation camp in collaboration with the Blood Bank of Seychelles Hospital.

Contributed