The Price of Kidney Disease

The cost isn’t just to your health

Four short years ago Stef first learned that his kidneys had failed. “I would be by Trish Reynolds sitting on a stool at the body shop where I worked and fall right off. The next thing I knew I was waking up on the floor.” Stef worked long hours, and admits that thinking about his health wasn’t always a priority. The diagnosis of both diabetes and high blood pressure—the two leading causes of kidney disease—came as a surprise, and learning his kidneys had failed was a shock.

Life with kidney disease has changed just about everything. No longer able to work at the job he loved, Stef says his new part-time job is dialysis. He makes the 30-minute drive to the dialysis unit three times a week. On his off-days his calendar is filled with further appointments. “The dialysis schedule itself isn’t so bad, it’s all of the appointments that makes it really hard,” Stef shares.

From medications, to gas, to hospital parking—there is no end kidney.ca to the expenses. “The travel up and down to the hospital, the parking at the hospital, going back and forth to the doctors . . . it all adds up, and it’s money I don’t have,” said Stef. Last year while hospitalized, Stef learned that he needed to vacate the house where he lived. The news was quite unexpected, and Stef wasn’t quite sure where to turn. The Kidney Foundation’s short-term financial assistance provided some support, and his friends helped him find a room to rent and move. “I had a chance to go into government subsidized housing, but even that was too expensive. I keep moving further and further away from my friends and my doctors, but the place where I am now is what I can afford.”

A 2018 report released by The Kidney Foundation of Canada: The Burden of Out-of-Pocket Costs for Canadians with Kidney Failure, has served as the cornerstone for many of The Kidney Foundation’s recent advocacy efforts by underscoring the financial hardships that kidney patients face every day. Unfortunately, Stef’s situation is not unique.

With increased out-of-pocket costs related to travel expenses to and from dialysis, medication costs and loss of work, more than 25 percent of patients saw their annual income decrease by at least 40 percent since starting dialysis. At a time when their kidneys are failing, the healthcare system is also failing individuals living with kidney disease.

Despite the hardships that Stef has faced, he wants others to know that there is life after a kidney disease diagnosis. He hopes that greater understanding of the many issues dialysis patients face, will encourage the government to make changes to help those who face increased costs because of kidney disease. “If you have kidney disease, you need a lot of help and The Kidney Foundation gives you that,” he added. 