One in four dialysis patients may die from COVID-19
Kidney specialist, Dr Amrish Krishnan says studies show that one in four dialysis patients is at risk of dying from COVID-19.
It comes as three dialysis treatment facilities in Suva had all reported positive cases of COVID-19 within two weeks.
“Patients with kidney failure are among the most vulnerable people during this COVID outbreak.
“Studies from centres overseas show that dialysis patients who contracted COVID1-9 have around 25 per cent case fatality,” Dr Krishnan said.
“That means one in four dialysis patients who contract COVID-19 may not survive the infection,” he said.
He runs The Kidney Hub at Rifle Range in Vatuwaqa and it was on June 29 that a COVID-19 case was detected in his clinic.
A week earlier, Permanent Secretary for Health and Medical Services Dr James Fong reported cases at the National Dialysis Centre in Nadera and the Kidney Foundation in Suva.
Dr Krishnan said: “This is why we encourage people to be vaccinated, when vaccination increases within our communities, it not only protects the individual
receiving the vaccine by lowering the risk of severe disease and death.
“It also starts to reduce the risk of transmission to others around them, and this includes people who may be more vulnerable, such as those with diabetes, kidney disease, heart failure, autoimmune conditions, and cancers. It is our moral obligation to protect these vulnerable members of society.
“We have a robust questionnaire-based screening programme, and temperature check before entry into the facility, and we have now also commenced questionnaire based screening via phone a day before
Dr Fong said: “It is a serious situation that we have picked up cases from dialysis units.
“Saying that it is serious does not mean that we did not expect it because these are people that are vulnerable to having the virus and they are congregating to a single unit or point for treatment.
“We did expect that there would be positive cases within these facilities.”
He added to mitigate the risks and to ensure that dialysis treatments were not affected the staff of the facility escalated the use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).