Improving Patient Quality of Life and Caregiver Burden by a Peer-Led Mentoring Program for Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease and Their Caregivers

Chronic kidney disease is very common in the United States, and throughout the world. An increasing number of individuals are diagnosed with late stages of chronic kidney disease, which require treatment with either dialysis or kidney transplant. The number of individuals currently requiring such treatment in the United States is greater than 600,000. Patients with advanced kidney disease and their family members face many challenges in dealing with the disease and the decisions that relate to choice of treatment. Quite frequently, patients and their family members are faced with the need to decide on a treatment option without full awareness of all the options. In such cases, they might make choices with which they will not be satisfied. Poor satisfaction with treatment choice is likely to result in poor quality of life for the patients and increased sense of burden for the caregiver.