Challenges for nephrology practice in Sub-Saharan Africa.

The burden of chronic kidney disease (CKD) and endstage kidney disease (ESKD) presents a challenge for both developed and emerging countries. While dialysis and transplantation consumes an ever-increasing proportion of the health budget in countries such as the United States, Japan and Taiwan, there is limited availability of these expensive therapies in the majority of emerging countries and even less in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) where diseases such as HIV/AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria account for much of the available funding.