[Chronic renal insufficiency. A permanent public health problem]

Chronic renal insufficiency raises an ever-increasing public-health problem due to its permanent growth among the general population and the escalating cost of renal replacement therapies. By the end of 1995 there were close to 33,700 patients with end-stage renal failure maintained alive with renal replacement methods in France. About 11,200 had a functioning kidney graft, whereas 22,500 were treated with various dialysis techniques, in and out-of-center hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis. An optimal health policy should contribute both to prevent renal insufficiency and offer each patient his/her best specific mode of treatment at the lowest cost for the community. Renal transplantation should be much more widely promoted and utilized through measures aiming at reducing the too high refusal rates of organ donation in subjects with brain-death. Promotion and extension of out-of-center dialysis techniques are also necessary. Design of reliable epidemiological studies dealing not only with end-stage renal failure patients but with the early stage and time-course of renal insufficiency is also mandatory. A deeper investigation in the area of renal-risk factors and a qualified follow-up of patients with mild/moderate renal insufficiency are essential to avoid or delay an evolution towards end-stage renal failure. Prevention of renal fibrosis has a central role in such a long-term public health-policy.