ABSTRACT
Rudy Bilous Audrey Collins Teaching Unit, Education Centre, James Cook University Hospital, Marton Road, MIDDLESBROUGH, TS4 3BW
INTRODUCTION
Since the last edition, the numbers of patients entering renal replacement therapy (RRT) with diabetic nephropathy as their primary disease continues to rise world-wide, although there are signs that the rate of increase has stabilised in the USA [1] and Japan [2]. Although short-term (1 year) mortality adjusted for age declined from 40.4 to 23.2 per 100 patient years in the decade 1986-96 in the USA, more recent data suggest that no further improvement has occurred since then [3]. Long-term survival of patients on RRT remains much less good for diabetic compared to non-diabetic recipients [3,4].
