LAHORE: The Pakistan Society of Nephrology (PSN) has expressed serious concern over the increasing burden of the Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) and the End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) incidence.

It states that the inadequate facilities in Pakistan, especially related to nephrology, would leave devastating impact if prompt measures are not taken by the government as well as other stakeholders.

The PSN as the only professional body of Pakistan`s nephrologists has been rendering services to educate the masses about the kidney problems and effective treatment to `everyone and everywhere.

Speaking to Dawn on the eve of the Word Kidney Day being observed on Thursday (today), Pakistan Society of Nephrology President Prof Waqar Ahmed said limitednnancial resources and a lack of infrastructure had put a severe strain on the existing health facilities due to the increasing burden of renal diseases.

`In Pakistan, like rest of the world diabetes is the most common cause of the CKD as about 45-50 per cent of End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) develops due to diabetes,` he said. He said at present, 6-7% of the country`s population is discovered diabetic each year but this number is increasing tremendously.

`It is estimated that in 2035, each year 11-12% of population will develop diabetes and Pakistan will be in the top 10 countries having the highest diabetic population,` said Dr Ahmed, who is also the Shaikh Zayed Hospital`s Kidney Department head.

He said this is only because of the lifestyle modification and urbanisation in the recent past few years.

`High blood pressure is the second most common cause of the ESRD,` he said, addingthat according to an estimate about 26pc of the adult population in Pakistan has high blood pressure and more provoking situation is that 58pc of these patients either don`t know about their blood pressure or are inadequately treated.

`Only 12.5% are getting the proper medi-cines to control their blood pressure within recommended limits,` said Prof Ahmed.

While talking about surgical intervention, he said transplantation was considered the most cost-effective treatment of the CKD.

However, it had high set-up costs with regards to infrastructure and required highly specialised teams, availability of organ donors and could not be done without dialysis backup.

The physical and legal infrastructurerequirements and cultural bias against organ donation often present barriers in many countries, making dialysis the default option, he said.

`The transplantation still has a long way to go in Pakistan. Only a few government hospitals are equipped with the infrastructure and technical expertise to perform transplantadon. The renal disease is on the rise in our country. The main reason would be the surge of incidence of diabetes,` he said.

He said the Society was making efforts to estabbsh internet-based registries of various renal diseases in the hope of generadng adequate information about patients with kidney problems. He further said it`s a matter of concern that data in Pakistan was limited due to unavailability of any renal registry.

The Society had recently started a renal registry to evaluate the impact of the disease in Pakistan.

`Overall 850 million people worldwide arenow estimated to have kidney diseases due to various causes,` he said.

`The CKD causes at least 2.4 million deaths per year worldwide and is now the 6th fastest growing cause of death. Acute kidney injury (AKI), an important driver of CKD, affects over 13 million people worldwide and 85% of these cases are found in low and middle-income countries like Pakistan,` he said. Around 1.7 people are estimated to die annually because of the AKI.

Moreover, the CKD and the AKI are important contributors to increased morbidity and mortality from other diseases and risk factors including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, hypertension and obesity.

The PNS president said the World Kidney Day is observed every year to spread public awareness regarding kidney disorders. The theme of the day this year is: `Kidney health for everyone everywhere.