Generally, renal diseases progress to a final stage as end-stage renal disease (ESRD) and function is substituted by renal replacement therapy (RRT), hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis, or transplantation. National and international registries of patients on RRT are useful for providing information on the prevalence of renal diseases in a given country. Data combined from different sources show that more than 1.5 million people worldwide are on RRT, 80 percent of whom live in Japan, Europe, and North America (Weening 2004).
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