Chronic renal failure in Al-Anbar of Iraq

There is no precise study of the epidemiology and prevalence of chronic renal failure in Al-Anbar, Iraq. Therefore, we studied 230 hemodialysis (HD) patients at the HD unit of Al-Ramadi teaching hospital during the period from April 1, 2008 to April 1, 2009. There were 124 (53%) male patients with a mean age of 48 ± 18.5 years, and 146 (63%) patients were older than 40 years. The estimated prevalence of chronic renal failure was 141 patients per million population. Diabetes mellitus (33%) and hypertension (22.6%) were the most common causes of chronic renal failure, followed in order by obstructive uropathy in 17.3%, undetermined causes in 14%, pyelonephritis in 4.7%, glomerulonephritis in 4.3%, and polycystic kidney disease in 3.9%. This study suggests that large number of patients with end-stage renal disease (ESRD) have diabetes and hypertension. However, those patients with undetermined cause still form a significant portion of etiology of ESRD, and this reflects late referral combined with diagnostic limitations.