Protecting Kidneys Before the Crisis: A Progress Report on Prevention, Care, and the Evidence Behind the Urgency
By Huzaifa Kermani | Chief Marketing Officer, NUR–Fatima Memorial System
April 20, 2026
Dear Friends and Supporters,
Kidney disease is one of the most under-recognised health emergencies in Pakistan. It advances silently — often without symptoms until irreversible damage has been done — and when it reaches its final stage, the cost of survival through dialysis frequently exceeds an entire household’s annual income. For the patients who come to Fatima Memorial Hospital, this is not a statistical abstraction. It is the reality of their lives.
This project exists to interrupt that trajectory: to identify patients early, manage conditions that drive kidney disease before they destroy kidney function, and extend access to the full spectrum of renal care — from screening and prevention through to dialysis — to patients who could not otherwise afford it. This report updates you on our work, the clinical context in which it operates, and why your support matters more than ever.
FMH Nephrology: A Department Built on Decades of Trust
Before speaking to the project’s activities, it is worth pausing on the institution behind it. The Nephrology Department at Fatima Memorial Hospital is not a new or peripheral service. It is one of the most established renal care programmes in Lahore, with over two decades of uninterrupted clinical service, research output, and postgraduate training behind it.
This depth of experience matters. Kidney disease is a complex, multi-system condition requiring not just clinical skill but a coordinated infrastructure. FMH Nephrology has built exactly that:
- A state-of-the-art Hemodialysis Centre equipped with advanced hemodialysis machines, providing round-the-clock dialysis services for both inpatient and outpatient cases.
- A pioneering Peritoneal Dialysis programme — FMH Nephrology is among the first hospitals in Punjab to have introduced peritoneal dialysis (PD) as a renal replacement option. The department offers PD catheter insertion, peritoneal equilibrium testing (PET), Automated Peritoneal Dialysis (APD), and personalised dietary and prescription management for all PD patients.
- Advanced procedural expertise, including ultrasound-guided kidney biopsy, permanent and temporary hemodialysis catheter insertion, central venous line insertion, and Point of Care Ultrasonography (PoCUS) — high-risk procedures performed by a skilled team under strict aseptic protocols.
- A CPSP-accredited postgraduate training programme (FCPS Nephrology), training the next generation of nephrologists for Lahore, Punjab, and Pakistan. Graduates of this programme now serve as competent nephrologists across the country.
- A Punjab Medical Faculty-accredited Dialysis Technician Training Programme — one of the very few in Pakistan — having trained over 20 technicians in four years.
- Active research publication in national and international journals, contributing to the evidence base for kidney care in the region.
- Multidisciplinary integrated care, with the Nephrology Department working closely with Cardiology, Endocrinology, Internal Medicine, and other departments — recognising that kidney disease rarely exists in isolation.
When a patient walks into FMH for kidney care, they are not receiving a best-effort response. They are receiving the output of two decades of institutional commitment to renal medicine at the highest clinical standard.
This project extends the reach of that commitment to those who cannot afford to access it.
The Crisis This Project Is Built to Address
Pakistan is facing a kidney disease epidemic, and the numbers demand to be stated plainly.
The National Burden of Kidney Disease
- CKD prevalence in Pakistan has been estimated as high as 23.3% in some population-based studies — the highest reported in South Asia — driven by the country’s extraordinarily high rates of uncontrolled hypertension and diabetes. (BMC Nephrology Systematic Review)
- Pakistan is among a small number of countries globally with over 10 million CKD cases. Globally, CKD now affects an estimated 788 million adults worldwide, up from 378 million in 1990. (The Lancet GBD 2023 Study)
- CKD is now the 9th leading cause of death globally and one of the fastest-growing causes of mortality — its prevalence having risen 40% over the past three decades. (GBD 2021 / Frontiers in Endocrinology)
- Pakistan’s dual epidemic of diabetes and hypertension — the two primary drivers of CKD — is worsening. The country now leads the world in diabetes prevalence, with 34.5 million adults affected, projected to reach 70.2 million by 2050. Hypertension prevalence mirrors this trajectory.
- The cost of dialysis in Pakistan ranges from USD 1,680 to USD 2,000 per year — a figure that routinely exceeds the annual income of affected families, most of whom live on between USD 110 and USD 500 per month. (Cureus / Pakistan dialysis economics study, 2025)
- Despite partial government subsidisation of dialysis sessions, patients face catastrophic out-of-pocket costs for medications, laboratory testing, nutrition, and transport — expenses that drive households into debt or force patients to abandon treatment entirely. (PMC, Economic Burden of Dialysis in Pakistan, 2025)
- Nearly all dialysis patients in Pakistan carry multiple serious comorbidities: 95.2% have at least one comorbidity, with anaemia (95.2%) and hypertension (85.7%) nearly universal. (PMC cross-sectional study, Punjab, 2025)
Why Prevention Is the Only Viable Strategy
The economics of kidney disease make prevention not merely desirable but essential. Once a patient reaches end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and requires dialysis, the cost burden — to the patient, to the family, and to the health system — becomes enormous. By contrast, identifying and managing the conditions that lead to kidney disease — hypertension, diabetes, infections, and nephrotoxic medication use — at an early stage is both clinically effective and a fraction of the downstream cost.
This is precisely the strategic logic of this project: invest in screening, patient education, and early management now, to prevent or delay the point at which a patient needs dialysis at all. Every patient whose CKD is identified in Stage 2 rather than Stage 5 is a patient whose kidneys may be preserved for years — and whose family may be spared catastrophic financial ruin.
What This Project Does: Activities and Reach
Through this project, Fatima Memorial Hospital’s Nephrology Department delivers kidney disease prevention and care to patients who cannot afford it. This includes:
- Community-level kidney health screening camps, identifying undiagnosed CKD, hypertension, and diabetes in high-risk populations before irreversible damage occurs.
- Subsidised or free consultations, diagnostic testing, and medications for indigent patients at all stages of kidney disease, removing the financial barrier that prevents most vulnerable patients from seeking care.
- Patient and community education on kidney health, risk factors, warning signs, and the importance of controlling blood pressure and blood sugar — the two most critical levers for preventing CKD progression.
- Access to dialysis services for patients who require renal replacement therapy but cannot afford private rates — ensuring that inability to pay does not determine who lives and who does not.
- Dietary counselling and lifestyle modification support, which evidence consistently shows can slow CKD progression and improve quality of life even in advanced stages.
The Patient Who Cannot Wait
“I did not know anything was wrong with my kidneys. I had high blood pressure for years but thought it was just stress. When I finally came to the hospital, the doctors told me my kidney function was already very low. They said if I had come six months earlier, we might have been able to do more. I wish I had known sooner.”
— Patient, FMH Nephrology OPD — 2026
This story is not uncommon. CKD is called a silent disease because it offers no dramatic warning signs in its early stages. By the time a patient feels unwell, significant and often irreversible damage has already occurred. The screening camps and outreach work funded by this project are designed to find these patients before that point — to give them the six months they did not otherwise have.
How Your Donation Creates Impact
- $25 — Funds a full kidney screening for one at-risk patient, including blood pressure monitoring and urinalysis.
- $50 — Covers diagnostic laboratory tests (creatinine, eGFR, urine albumin) for one patient — the tests that detect CKD before symptoms appear.
- $100 — Funds one month of essential medications for a CKD patient managing hypertension or diabetes to slow disease progression.
- $250 — Supports a community screening camp session, reaching dozens of undiagnosed patients in a single day.
- $500 — Subsidises multiple dialysis sessions for an indigent patient who would otherwise be unable to afford treatment.
- Monthly giving — Provides the sustained, predictable funding our clinical team needs to maintain screening calendars, medication supplies, and dialysis capacity without interruption.
Looking Ahead
The next phase of this project will focus on:
- Expanding community kidney health screening to additional high-risk communities in peri-urban Lahore, with particular focus on populations with uncontrolled diabetes and hypertension.
- Strengthening the patient education and follow-up system, ensuring that patients identified at screening are tracked, supported, and retained in care.
- Continuing to provide subsidised dialysis access to indigent patients, in parallel with FMH Nephrology’s ongoing commitment to clinical excellence.
- Deepening the research and documentation of outcomes, to build the evidence base for kidney disease prevention in Pakistan’s peri-urban population.
Pakistan’s government has not yet developed a dedicated national CKD strategy. In the absence of that, it falls to institutions like Fatima Memorial Hospital — with the clinical depth, the track record, and the community reach — to fill that gap. That is what this project does, and it does it for patients who have nowhere else to turn.
A Final Appeal
Kidney disease does not announce itself. By the time it does, it is often too late to prevent the worst. The most powerful thing your donation can do is fund the moment of early detection — the screening that finds the problem before it becomes a catastrophe, and connects a patient to the world-class care available at Fatima Memorial Hospital’s Nephrology Department.
Please donate today. Please share this project with someone who can. And if you are in a position to give monthly, please consider doing so — it is the most impactful form of support for a programme that runs year-round, for patients whose kidneys cannot wait.
Detect early. Treat with excellence. Preserve life.
Thank you for standing with us.
Huzaifa Kermani
Chief Marketing Officer
NUR–Fatima Memorial System | Fatima Memorial Hospital, Lahore
Research References:
GBD 2023 CKD Collaborators. “Global, regional, and national burden of chronic kidney disease, 1990–2023.” The Lancet, November 2025.
Xie et al. “Global, regional, and national burden of chronic kidney disease, 1990–2021.” Frontiers in Endocrinology, 2025. PMC11919670.
BMC Nephrology. “Prevalence of chronic kidney disease in South Asia: a systematic review.” 2018.
Cureus / PMC. “Economic Burden and Clinical Epidemiology of Dialysis: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of CKD Patients.” Pakistan, 2025. PMC12559013.
Fatima Memorial Hospital. Nephrology Department overview. fatimamemorial.org.pk, 2024.
The Lancet Global Health. “Global disparities in kidney disease burden and care.” 2024.
Al-Shifa Trust Eye Hospital. Media statement on diabetes burden in Pakistan. December 2025.
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