28/01/2025
President Founder Hope Kidney Foundation | Dr Salman Shakoh
Hope Kidney Foundation was formed in January 1994 to help patients and families suffering from kidney disease.
It was 1994, and I had been a nephrologist and a professor at Mayo Hospital Lahore, and King Edward Medical College, for 10 years. During this time, I often saw patients suffering from renal failure. These patients had two options - either a kidney transplant, or a lifetime dialysis, both too costly for most families. For most low to middle class families, the unfortunate and likely third option was to wait for a slow death.
I saw first-hand how families are crippled, as dialysis requires at least 2 sessions per week, for 2-3 hours per session. The patient is no longer able to keep a regular job, and needs to be accompanied by an attendant. A family might displace education and clothing for a few months, but then financially give-up.
I saw the shortage of nephrologists in Pakistan and trained medical students. Many dialysis centers were run by technicians, with an actual nephrologist making rare visits. This resulted in lower quality treatment, made worse by lower quality supplies.
I could not stand by, while families suffered and patients died. In 1994, along with philantropist Sh. Moeen-ud-Din, we established the Hope Kidney Foundation. It took two years to save enough, buy equipment, and convince the government hospital to allow for the free dialysis center. In 1996, we established the first ever free haemodialysis center at Sir Ganga Ram hospital.
One center could not reach enough patients. What could we do? A key part of the problem was to bring costs down further. With that in mind, I opened R&D centers to innovate and manufacture supplies at a lower cost. This brought the cost per dialysis further down, and we donate the locally made supplies to the Hope Kidney Foundation.
Public education on prevention can reach even more patients. The greatest impact we can have is to widely educate patients to prevent or slowdown kidney disease. Therefore, local language literature is one of our main missions.
Since our formation, we have opened multiple dialysis centers, and performed over 30,000 free dialysis sessions along with free dialysis kits and medicine kits. Many physicians and students have been trained on these remedies, and talks have been given in global conferences on innovations on kidney dialysis, supplies, and widening public access.
