Kidney patients to increase to 106,000 in next 20 years

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 18 (Bernama) --  The number of Malaysians with kidney problems nationwide is expected to increase to 106,000 by 2040, said Health Ministry medical development division director Datuk Dr Bahari Awang Ngah.

He said based on data from the National Renal Registry Malaysia, some 39,711 patients were on dialysis due to kidney failure in 2016.

“The number, however, will continue to increase double fold every year. More worryingly, 64 per cent of those patients requiring haemodialysis treatment were diabetics,” he told reporters after launching MyBuahPinggang Facebook page here today.

Dr Bahari also encouraged stage five of chronic kidney disease (CKD) patients to undergo peritoneal dialysis (PD) compared to haemodialysis treatment.

PD or the process of washing in and out of the abdominal cavity (belly) in cycles is a dialysis option that provides a better quality of life compared to haemodialysis treatment.

“For now, we give freedom to the patients to choose the type of dialysis treatments. The PD treatment began in the 60s and the ministry targets 30 to 40 per cent of patients to use PD this year,” 

Dr Bahari said the best way to treat kidney problems was by kidney transplant but the number of organ donors was still low.

“The ratio is three donors to one million population. People are still skeptical about organ transplant although it is allowed in religion,” he added.

MyBuahPinggang is an official public page on Facebook which was developed on July 2 to encourage sharing of knowledge with regards to CKD and treatment especially PD and other related information.

-- BERNAMA