Patients dialysed at for-profit centres do worse

Patients with end stage renal disease who receive dialysis at for-profit centres have higher rates of death and complication than those receiving such care at non-profit facilities, according to a study led by researchers from Harvard Medical School and Johns Hopkins University Medical School (New England Journal of Medicine 1999;341:1653-60, 1691-3).

The study also found that patients who had dialysis at commercially driven clinics were less likely to be placed on waiting lists to have a kidney transplant than their counterparts treated at non-profit centres.

DrPushkal Garg, DrKevin Frick, …