The European Best Practice Guidelines for the Anaemia Management (EBPG) represents the main reference for the treatment of patients with chronic renal failure (CRF). This study was developed two years after EBPG's publication in order to evaluate the impact of theses guidelines in the clinical practice. This is an epidemiological, multicentric and prospective study including patients on dialysis and erythropoietin treatment. The aetiology of CRF, prevalence and anaemia treatment, concurrent pathologies and side effects had been evaluated during follow-up. The inclusion period was june-august 2000. Patients were evaluated during six months. Two thousands six hundred and eighteen dialysis patients were recruited from different national centres (2,171 on haemodialysis and 447 on peritoneal dialysis). Fifty one percent of haemodialysis patients and forty one percent of patients on peritoneal dialysis started erythropoietin treatment with a basal haemoglobin > 9 g/dL (mean 8.9 g/dL and 9.2 g/dL, respectively). At baseline, 35% of patients had haemoglobin < 11 g/dL (mean 11.4 g/dL), but at the study end, 21.2% had haemoglobin < 11 g/dL (mean 11.8 g/dL). Seventy nine percent of patients were treated with erythropoietin using subcutaneous route: 27.5% with once a week regimen, 33.0% in two weekly doses and 39.5% in three weekly administrations. No differences in doses requirements were showed by administration route. These results seem to support that there already exists a good knowledge of the International Guidelines for the anaemia management, but there is still a gap between them and the results in the clinical setting. In general erythropoietin treatment starts late and at low haemoglobin levels. However, close monitoring of haemoglobin levels seems to improve patient's outcomes.