Tag

kidney transplantation

The ESRD Program and Single Payer Medicine

July 21, 2019

In 1972 the nephrology community convinced congress to pay for the treatment of patients with end stage renal disease (ESRD). Thus, the federal government assumed fiscal responsibility for chronic dialysis and kidney transplantation. We sold the program by telling congress that it would save lives (true) and that it would not be very expensive (decidedly […]

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End Stage Kidney Disease: Costs and Treatment

March 16, 2016

About 1 million people  in the US have End Stage Renal Disease (ESRD). Treatment is divided roughly 70/30 between dialysis and kidney transplantation. The annual cost of the ESRD program, almost all of which is funded by Medicare, is more than $48 billion. It costs about $89,000 a year to care for a dialysis patient. The […]

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