A Pragmatic Approach to CKD Patient Education

Plain-language summary

Over 350,000 adult Arkansans have chronic kidney disease (CKD) and 9 out of 10 (312,000) of these Arkansans are unaware of having it. A "Know Your Kidney Number" (eGFR) poster (KYKN) campaign is being launched statewide to increase CKD awareness and detection. As awareness increases, the demand for patient education will increase. Educating patients has proven to be effective in delaying CKD progression and establishing optimal renal replacement therapy (RRT) when needed. CKD patient education has historically been provided by nephrology clinicians. Yet most patients are not referred to nephrology until the patient is nearing the need for RRT. Novel pragmatic approaches to reaching and educating patients earlier in their disease state and partnering with a broader pool of clinicians that can provide the education is needed. Most problems related to CKD start when kidney function is \~45 %, earlier education can empower patients to make changes to protect their kidney function earlier and plan for RRT. University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences (UAMS) developed and copyrighted the "CKD: What You Need to Know" patient education system. Research showed almost 90% of the attendees could choose a modality after either tele-education (TE) or face to face (FTF) education. Home modality choices doubled. Patients were able to make informed choices regardless of the modality of education. Of those starting RRT 47% started on a home modality or received a transplant. This compares to 10% nationally. Both transplant and home dialysis have better outcomes and are less costly compared to in-center hemodialysis. Harp's Pharmacy has a successful medication therapy management (MTM) program where pharmacists are provided time for patient-centered activities for patients with diabetes (DM), hypertension (HTN), the 2 leading causes for CKD, and heart failure (HF), the leading cause of death in CKD. Thirty six percent of patients with DM will develop CKD and hypertension can be both a cause and an effect of CKD. In this project Harp's Pharmacy will use the MTM infrastructure to add CKD to the program in select pharmacies in the delta. The CKD tools build on and support actions that improve the underlying conditions that are already being addressed. The "CKD: What You Need to Know" tools will be used with patients with known CKD or 2 of the 3 conditions covered by MTM and randomized into 1 of 2 education arms that offer various levels of support or a control arm.

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