Please Note: High-Resolution copies of these reports can be requested from sam.faalilo@kidney.health.nz
This report, the first undertaken surveying of Aotearoa New Zealand’s kidney dialysis regions, shows
some are operating beyond capacity, placing a huge burden of care on over -stretched staff in order
to get by.
The report’s findings paint a concerning picture of a health service struggling to cope and at breaking point, despite the best efforts of dedicated staff.
Our report found that the 15 dialysis facilities surveyed are being affected by capacity constraints, with half struggling from chronic under-staffing, too few dialysis treatment chairs, and a lack of physical infrastructure.
Māori in Aotearoa me Te Waipounamu/ New Zealand have endured poor health experiences and outcomes related to chronic kidney disease.
Healthcare providers and whānau Māori describe health services for chronic kidney disease that fail to uphold the principles of the Treaty of Waitangi (partnership, active protection, equity, and options).
These guidelines take a strengths-based approach and focus on interventions at a health services and health provider level to provide hauora (health and wellbeing) among whānau Māori affected by chronic kidney disease.
The topics in these guidelines were identified as important by Māori patients and whānau who attended one of four hui (focus groups).
The proposed guideline was supported by Kidney Health New Zealand, who facilitated a funding application to the New Zealand Ministry of Health. Funding of $17,000 was provided by the Ministry to conduct a community review of the need for this guideline and formal discussions with whānau Māori affected by chronic kidney disease.
On Tuesday 23 November 2021 Kidney Health New Zealand released a major report into transplants numbers in New Zealand. “The findings from this watershed report are a shock, and reinforce the urgent need for the government to act now to implement its own 2017 National Deceased Organ Donation Strategy and overturn decades of underinvestment, treatment inequity and fragmented service delivery”.
The report, commissioned by KHNZ shows that 3,700 Kiwis received dialysis treatment in 2020 at an average cost of $115,000 per annum. The report dramatically predicts a ‘veritable tsunami of demand’ for dialysis treatment in the years ahead. Dialysis patient numbers have grown by 24% in the past six years and are modelled to rise a further 30% in the coming decade, a reflection of exploding rates of Type 2 diabetes, particularly among Māori and Pasifika patients. It concludes that without action, the cost of dialysis in 2031/32 will be $150 million higher than it is now.