Kidney disease is now claiming people two decades younger than it did in the past, warn doctors at Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences.
The institute has been seeing an increasing load of patients who seek its help for dialysis and renal transplant. To meet the increased demand, the hospital had sought additional dialysis machines, which were provided and inaugurated for use in a dedicated dialysis unit here on Wednesday. Telangana Health Minister C. Laxma Reddy, who presided over the inaugural ceremony, was alarmed by the rising prevalence and reduced age of the onset of kidney disease.
“While having more and improved infrastructure to combat kidney disease is the need of the hour, can we not work to safeguard the kidney?” Dr. Reddy asked experts during the inaugural. In all, 40 new machines were provided to the hospital.
Doctors at the hospital say many they had treated in the recent times were younger than 40 years of age and the number of patients they treat continues to increase over time.
“We have seen increasing number of cases, where three generations of a family were treated in a span of a decade. While survival after treatment has increased, the age of the onset of kidney problems has also decreased,” said Sree Bhushan Raju, who heads the nephrological department at the hospital. The hospital sees around 60 to 70 patients add every month to its long list of patients availing dialysis facility, informed Dr. Raju. As a result, the dialysis centre runs throughout the day, with some patients asked to avail treatment past midnight. “With more machines, we expect the burden to reduce. We also hope that centres can come up in the periphery of the city, so that patients need not travel to Hyderabad for dialysis,” Dr. Raju said adding that the Siddipet Government Hospital is one centre under the aegis of NIMS.
