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A busy start to 2010 for the RDRTF |
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A busy start to 2010 for the RDRTF
In Chile, an intervention team has been put on standby to treat potential kidney disease patients. This illustrates the encouraging signs of solidarity across the Latin-American nephrology community. So far, the ISN RDRTF has not intervened as the Chilean nephrological community has been able to keep everything under control. Sociedad Latino-Americana de Nephrologia e Hipertension (SLANH ) and its Chair Dr. R. Correa-Rotter as well as Dr. W. Douthat from Argentina and Dr . Rodrigo from Brazil are ready to offer help to Chilean dialysis patients.There have been almost no cases of acute kidney injuries reported. In Concepcion, several dialysis units were out of order, essentially due to a shortage of drinking water. Patients were relocated, attempts were made to repair the water provisioning and evacuate patients from outside the damaged area. After a successful two month mission in Haiti, the team has now gradually transferred its duties to the local medical community. One last task before leaving was to instruct local doctors on how to position permanent tunneled central vein catheters. For the first time, the RDRTF used a point of care dry chemistry device to immediately determine basic levels of creatinine and potassium. This was possibly, the first time the technique was introduced in Haiti.Overall, the mission was a success even though enormous logistic and communication problems affected the delivery of materials. Volunteers had to cope with some of the most extreme disaster conditions. 25 volunteers participated from 8 countries including 11 renal nurses, 9 physicians and 5 dialysis technicians. It also revealed the tremendous collaboration between Médecins Sans Frontières and other nephrology groups and societies, especially the Sociedad Latino-Americano de Nefrologia e Hipertension (SLANH), the Disaster Task Force of the American Society of Nephrology (ASN), the Dominican Society of Nephrology, Société de Néphrology and nephrologists from Martinique.
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