ISPD Fellowship Program – Round 2 of 2023 is open!
The Scholarship and Awards Committee will receive applications for the second round of ISPD Fellowships until 30 September 2023.
The ISPD provides funds for 12 nephrologists and nurses to travel abroad every year, to get the best training available at one of the Reference Centers that have joined our program. Each ISPD Fellow will be receiving up to $5000 USD to cover the costs associated with their stay. We aim to select 6 candidates in this round of applications.
Find more information on the ISPD Fellowships application page, including eligibility, detailed instructions on how to apply, and the links to download the application form.
Please share this information with other colleagues who may be eligible. Please note that it is not necessary to be an ISPD member to apply for the ISPD Fellowship. ISPD Fellows receive a 1-year complimentary ISPD membership after the completion of their fellowship.
If your hospital would like to be included in the List of Reference ISPD Fellowship Centers, please contact our office at admin@ispd.org.
Host the next ISPD meeting in 2026
While the preparations for the ISPD 2024 Dubai Congress are progressing swiftly, we are starting the process to select our host venue for 2026.
We invite our members to consider working together with the ISPD to bring the latest advances in PD to their home country and region. The only rotation condition is that the country has to be outside Europe, and the city should not have hosted any major adult nephrology event in the five years prior to the date of the event.
The ISPD has released the RPF (Request for Proposals) for the upcoming ISPD Congress in 2026. It contains all the necessary information to prepare your bid for becoming the host of our next ISPD congress after Dubai 2024.
We are looking to receive bids from national or regional societies in the field of Nephrology (or Peritoneal Dialysis). Alternatively, bids coming from conference centers or convention bureaus are welcome as well, under the condition that they have secured the committed involvement of their relevant national society.
Anyone interested in putting forward a bid should email our Secretariat as soon as possible. We will be able to assist you during the whole process.
We aim to announce the host of our 2026 Congress by the end of this year, therefore we are expecting to receive proposals by the end of August 2023. You can find all the deadlines in the RFP document.
ISPD presence in the AFRAN’23 meeting in Egypt
The ISPD team present at the AFRAN meeting in Cairo (composed of ISPD President Prof. Edwina Brown, Prof. Fred Finkelstein, Middle East Chapter chair and ISPD Dubai 2024 Congress co-Chair Prof Ali Abu-Alfa, Renal Nurse Dr. Grace Ngaruiya, and Saving Young Lives-SYL Chairperson Dr. Brett Cullis) witnessed the growing enthusiasm among African nephrologists for expanding access to PD in different parts of Africa. Through networking with local nephrologists, industry representatives, and some national societies, they also learned about the barriers to PD in the continent and how to break these down. The ISPD symposium and the joint ISN-ISPD Policy Forum were a space to share expertise and to exchange views on the way to push forward, and hopefully to inspire the participants to persevere in their efforts to grow PD in their hard circumstances.
At the same time, the ISPD team was inspired by the enthusiasm of the young nephrologists who participated in the PD catheter insertion training session arranged by Saving Young Lives, under the leadership of Brett Cullis, and supported locally by Rasha Darwish. Rasha is determined to get PD restarted in Egypt, no matter what it takes. As an example, she contacted several butchers until she got all the pig bellies necessary for the models for catheter insertion – not an easy task in a Muslim country! The number of attendees at the SYL workshop surpassed all expectations with over 50 people crowded round watching the first demonstration and then enjoying the opportunity of having a try individually.
The positive energy from the AFRAN participants bodes well for the growth of PD in Africa, and the insight that the ISPD got from participating in this event will enable our society to better assist these PD enthusiasts in Africa to have an impact in their countries, mostly through initiatives from the Education Committee, the International Liaison Committee, and the Scholarships and Awards Committee.
ISPD President’s New Year message 2023
Dear ISPD friends and colleagues
Although it is just over 4 months since I became the ISPD president, a lot has already happened. But before updating you all, I want to take this opportunity to extend good wishes to you all for the New Year and hope that you had some time to relax and celebrate with families and friends. 2022 has certainly been a rollercoaster year starting with continuing pandemic restrictions, but as these eased we have had the excitement associated with return of travel, in person meetings and the pleasure of getting together again with friends and colleagues. The very successful ISPD meeting in Singapore in August 2022 demonstrated the value of being together in comparison to seeing each other in square boxes on screens.
As a society, we have learnt a lot from the Covid experience. For some of us, it resulted in harder work with PD at long last being recognised as a successful dialysis modality for AKI even in ITU’s in high income countries, and for many PD units, there has been an increase in the number of patients starting PD with the rather belated realisation from doubting colleagues that there are many advantages of dialysis at home. But it is not just in the clinical arena that things have changed. The increased use of digital technologies during Covid has changed the way that we as a society communicate with each other and deliver education. Looking forward into 2023, this will continue to evolve with an active webinar education programme with the opportunity of targeting to the needs of individual countries. With the use of now well-established video-conferencing, committees can be much more active than in previous years. And for Council meetings we are investing in technology to enable hybrid meetings so that many more members can attend. We are also undertaking a review of how we use social media to enhance society activities.
In my first letter on becoming President, I stated that I wanted to broaden Committee membership and involve new people, develop greater nurse involvement and develop activities that support increased growth of PD globally. I am delighted to report that we had many applications for committee membership and some people were disappointed – but now knowing who they are, we hope to involve them in other activities. I am particularly pleased to say that we now have our first Committee Chair who is a nurse and will therefore sit on Council, and a nurse deputy-chair who will join Council in 2026 on becoming a committee chair. This is in addition to the Chair and Deputy Chair of the Nursing Liaison Committee. The aim of increasing PD growth globally is being supported by the development of the International Home Dialysis Consortium in collaboration with the ISN. The aim is to have a launch meeting at WCN 2024 with plans being developed for this at a meeting in Bangkok during WCN 2023. ISPD is also being asked to develop symposia, contribute speakers and/or policy forums at several meetings including: AFRAN (February), WCN (March), Korea (April), SLANH (May), ERA (June), EuroPD (November).
Finally, I would like us all to think about why and what is the value of being a member of ISPD. For many, it is to have access to Peritoneal Dialysis International. This continues to flourish and develop with Jeff Perl as editor who has started some fantastic education initiatives, is involving younger PD colleagues as well as publishing excellent research contributions. Many PD team members, though, are not so interested in PDI access – they can get it through university libraries, from colleagues or are not research minded. Being a member, one can become involved in committees and work groups including those involved with writing and updating guidelines. But I would also like to see ISPD becoming a club that PD professionals (nurses, doctors, dieticians, industry partners and others) want to belong to and get support from. We therefore need to look at different types of membership and communication tools to achieve this. With the development of group memberships and different rates of fees, we now have over 1000 members. I am hoping for many more by the end of my time as president.
The next time we meet as a society is in Dubai in September 2024 when we shall also be celebrating the 40th anniversary of the formation of ISPD. Before then, the North American Chapter will be meeting during the Annual Dialysis Congress in March and the Asian-Pacific chapter will be holding its own meeting in Delhi in September.
With best wishes to you all for 2023 – and hoping that there are many opportunities for us as PD colleagues to get together and promote the vision of ISPD: “A future in which PD is freely available and equitably accessible worldwide as a reliable, affordable, sustainable and life-saving option for patients with acute kidney injury or end stage kidney disease.”
Best wishes
Edwina Brown
ISPD President
Support to Sri Lanka PD nurses – an ISPD success story
Because of the existing links between the Imperial College Renal and Transplant Centre and Sri Lanka, I was asked whether I could help with nurse training for the expanding Sri Lankan PD programme. In January 2020, the ISPD funded my travel to spend 10 days delivering workshops in PD centres and then help with interactive workshops at a multiprofessional national meeting on PD in Kandy which was supported by ISPD, ISN, and Sri Lankan Society of Nephrology. This was attended by 85 multi-professional delegates (nephrologists, nephrology trainees, medical officers, and PD nurses). For this visit, I developed an interactive PD education program for nurses held as two-day workshops in 3 major units – Kandy, Anuradhapura, and Colombo. Over 100 nurses attended these sessions not only from the main units but also from other small PD units and units that would like to start PD. Generally, in Sri Lanka, although the nurses in the main units were trained to perform PD, they were still experiencing many complications such as exit site infections, draining issues, and poor patient compliance. Therefore, the sessions focused on PD-related complications, challenging PD cases, technique-related complications, and moreover quality improvement efforts to grow PD in remote areas with resource scarcity.
I strongly believe that this visit was helpful in empowering nurses with more knowledge and skills to reaffirm and improve their actual practice. Since then, I have remained in contact with some of the nurses I have met, answered questions about practice and I think has helped support the start of new PD units. PD nurses play a crucial role in educating patients and keeping them safe and improving the outcomes of PD programmes in general. It has been particularly rewarding helping PD develop, and therefore patients gain access to dialysis, in a country with limited dialysis resources.
Titus Chelapurath
PD nurse
Imperial College Healthcare NHS Trust
Hammersmith Hospital
London
W12 0HS
Preparation visit to Dubai – October 2022
The ISPD President Prof. Edwina Brown and the ISPD Society Coordinator Miguel Gallardo traveled to Dubai on 17-18 October. They were joined there by the President of the EMAN Dr. Mona AlRukhaimi and Prof Ali Abu Alfa, acting as the heads of the Local Organising Committee for the ISPD Congress 2024, and Mr. Waleed Refaay, from the PCO who will assist us in organizing the best possible congress.
The attendants of the meeting with Dubai’s Mureum of the Future (in the backgroud) which will become a recognisible landmark for the 2044 ISPD Congress.
The short two-day visit was intense with several meetings with different stakeholders to give a big impulse to the preparations for the ISPD Congress 2024. We visited different locations for the congress and held meetings with the responsible teams of each venue. We were received by the Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism, whose team welcomed us and offered their support in different aspects of the event preparations.
We also took this opportunity to establish the coordination dynamics between the ISPD, the Local Organising Committee, and the PCO: After the meeting, we have already set the calendar with the main steps for the whole process of organising the congress.
We left Dubai after two days with a more clear vision of what will the ISPD 2024 Congress in Dubai look like. Our first congress in the Middle East will be a milestone for our society and will have a positive impact in that region and bring together many participants from all over the world to learn, connect and cooperate for advancing PD and improving the lives of patients.
Join ISPD Committees 2022-24: Call for Expressions of Interest (EOI)
The ISPD is looking for motivated members to join the different ISPD Committees and fill in the vacancies left after the ISPD Congress 2022 in Singapore. The term for ISPD members in committees has a duration of 2 years (until the ISPD Congress 2024) and can be extended twice to a maximum of 6 years.
Below you’ll find a list of all the vacancies on each committee, including the geographical locations that are needed, since we strive to have geographical and gender balance on all ISPD teams. We also aim to incorporate nurses and other kidney health professionals (dietitians and nutritionists, social workers, pharmacists, etc) into every committee so if you belong to this category don’t hesitate to apply for the available positions, we need to incorporate your experience and knowledge into our society work.
To apply for one or more of the vacancies, please send an email to admin@ispd.org including a short motivation letter 250-300 words, and your CV. Please note that only ISPD members can be part of the committees. You can join the ISPD now or renew your membership.
The deadline to submit your Expressions of Interest is September 21.
If you know some motivated ISPD members, feel free to encourage them to join the ISPD Committees!
LIST OF VACANCIES PER COMMITTEE
COMMUNICATION COMMITTEE
We are looking for members from Latin America, Europe, and one nurse/kidney health professional (KHP).
EDUCATION COMMITTEE
We are looking for members from North America, and one nurse/KHP.
FUTURE MEETINGS COMMITTEE
We are looking for members from Latin America, Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Oceania; and one nurse/KHP.
INTERNATIONAL LIAISON COMMITTEE
We are looking for one nurse/KHP.
INTERNATIONAL STUDIES COMMITTEE
We are looking for members from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East.
NOMINATING COMMITTEE
We are looking for members from Asia, Oceania, North America, Africa, and the Middle East.
We are looking for one motivated member from any region to become Deputy Chair.
NURSES COMMITTEE
We are looking for three motivated nurses/KHP to join our committee
SCHOLARSHIPS AND AWARDS COMMITTEE
We are looking for one candidate from Europe to join this committee.
STANDARDS AND GUIDELINES COMMITTEE
We are looking for one motivated member from any region to become Deputy Chair.
To find out what are the tasks of each one of the committees, please visit the Committees section on our website.
ISPD Fellowship Program – Round 2 of 2022 is now open!
The Scholarship and Awards Committee will receive applications for the second round of ISPD Fellowships until 30 September 2022.
The ISPD Council provides funds for 12 nephrologists and nurses to travel abroad every year, to get the best training available at one of the Reference Centers that have joined our program. Each ISPD Fellow will be receiving up to $5000 USD to cover the costs associated with their stay. We aim to select 6 candidates in this round of applications.
Find more information on the ISPD Fellowships application page, including eligibility, detailed instructions on how to apply, and the links to download the application form.
Please share this information with other colleagues who may be eligible. Please note that it is not necessary to be an ISPD member to apply for the ISPD Fellowship. ISPD Fellows receive a 1-year complimentary ISPD membership.
If your hospital would like to be included in the List of Reference ISPD Fellowship Centers, please contact our office at admin@ispd.org.
ISPD Fellowship Program – Round 1 of 2022 is now open!
The Scholarship and Awards Committee will receive applications for the second round of ISPD Fellowships until 31 March 2022.