It's Thursday morning and the waiting area at the Jaramogi Oginga Odinga Teaching and Referral Hospital
renal unit is already filling up.
Patients sit quietly, some scrolling
through their phones, others staring
into space, lost in thought.
Among
them is 30-year-old Victor Onyango,
who has been coming here for dialysis
since 2022.
His face is calm, but his journey
has been anything but easy.
The rhythmic humming of machines doing the work of failing
kidneys fills the air.
“When I first heard about kidney
disease and screenings, I thought it
didn’t apply to me, you know, when
you think of going to the hospital just
for a test, you feel like you are inviting
diseases upon yourself,” he says.
Onyango’s journey began in 2022,
when he was still in Form 4. His legs
started swelling, his body felt heavy
and felt dizzy often.
Desperate for answers, he visited
several hospitals, but none could provide a clear explanation, until he was
referred to JOOTRH where doctors
discovered the cause of his symptoms,
a chronic kidney disease.
“I was shocked,” Onyango recalls.
“I never thought it would be something so serious. I was told my kidneys
had failed, and I had two options, dialysis or a transplant. I chose dialysis
because I simply couldn’t afford a
transplant due to the cost.”
But as Onyango soon realised, dialysis wasn’t a quick fix. It became
his new reality, an exhausting, unrelenting routine that changed his life.
Twice a week, he would travel to
the hospital, an effort that required
not only money for transport but also
the emotional toll of adapting to his
new life.
His diet changed drastically, and
the foods he once enjoyed were now
off-limits. Even his energy levels became unpredictable.
Sometimes, his blood levels would
drop, and he’d need blood donations
from family and friends just to survive.
“Dialysis is not easy,” Onyango admits.
The financial burden also never eased. While NHIF used to cover
many costs, the shift to the Social
Health Authority programme has left
patients like him struggling.
Dialysis
is still covered, but many essential
drugs are not.
“I spend around Sh600 a month
just for my medication and that’s not
even counting transport and other
costs. It’s a constant struggle,” he says.
The strain is not just on families
but also on the healthcare system.
JOOTRH chief executive officer
Richard Lesiyampe, spoke about the
challenges faced by dialysis patients,
emphasising how draining the process can be, not just for the patients,
but for their families and the country
as a whole.
“Dialysis is a difficult, resource-heavy process,” he said, adding that patients need more than one
session a week, and each session costs
a significant amount if not covered.
In a year, one patient will spend close to Sh1.5 million just on dialysis. It’s
a burden.”
The hospital has taken steps to improve care for these patients, increasing the number of dialysis machines
and beds from seven to 17 in recent
months to cater for the growing demand.
Yet, Lesiyampe believes more needs
to be done, especially when it comes
to kidney transplants.
“We want to ensure we can offer
transplant services here, so patients
don’t have to rely on dialysis forever.
Dialysis can sustain life for 10 to 15
years, but a transplant can give them
a new lease on life,” he says.
The need for kidney transplants is growing, with JOOTRH alone
serving around 60 dialysis patients.
However the number for dialysis
patients across the county’s health
facilities swells to over 350.
Lesiyampe called for more specialists in the region, highlighting the
urgent need for kidney transplant
programmes to save lives and reduce
the reliance on dialysis.
Dr Florentius Ndinya, a consultant physician and nephrologist at
JOOTRH, said early screening for
kidney disease is important.
“Kidney disease often goes unnoticed until it reaches advanced stages,”
he said, adding that the most important thing is early detection, which can prevent or delay the progression to
end-stage kidney failure.
JOOTRH during World Kidney
Day offered free screening services
to the public, encouraging people to
get tested even if they don’t feel sick.
Ndinya noted that many of the patients on dialysis are in their prime
working years, between the ages of
30 and 50, which makes the issue all
the more pressing.
“Chronic conditions like hypertension and diabetes are major risk
factors for kidney disease. If we can
identify these conditions early, we can
prevent them from developing into
full-blown kidney failure.”
Unfortunately, many people only
visit the hospital when they are already feeling unwell, often when
the disease has advanced too far to
reverse.
The solution, according to Dr
Ndinya, is routine screening, which
can detect kidney disease before
symptoms appear and help doctors
intervene early.
While dialysis remains the primary treatment for many patients,
JOOTRH is integrating newer technology, such as Hemodiafiltration,
which removes more toxins from the
body than dialysis.
Dr Nyinya noted that before the
introduction of the new technology,
they were using the conventional hemodialysis machine for management
of chronic kidney disease.
The conventional hemodialysis machine also follows the same principle
of online HDF of removing waste
and managing acidity in the body, but
the process was restricted to filtering
out smaller particles of waste from
the body.
“The conventional hemodialysis
machine can remove toxins, but up
to a certain level. The new technology,
on the other hand, removes slightly
more toxic waste, what we consider
slightly larger molecular waste toxins.”
Dr Ndinya added that the online
HDF machine is a game changer and
will go along way in improving the
quality of life for patients with chronic kidney disease.
He added, “If we can improve dialysis outcomes while working towards
transplants, we can significantly extend patients’ lives.”
However, he noted that not every
patient is a candidate for transplant.
As Onyango prepares for his session, he has one message for the
public, “Go for screening, it is very
important.”
