Chair: Professor Sunil Bhandari (2021 - present)

Current Membership:

• Mubarak Janmohd 
• Heidy Hendra
• Charlotte Snead
• Ben Storey
• Kate Bramham
• Pooja Gudka
• Ibi Erekosima
• Indranil Dasgupta
• Alan Salama
• Aimun Ahmed
• Neil Turner
• Alirio Belchior
• Gavin Dreyer
• Arvind Ponnusamy
• Debasish Banerjee
• Mordi Muorah
• Catherine Maina

Past Chairs

• Professor Alan Salama (2019 - 2021)
• Professor Iain MacPhee (2017 – 2019)
• Professor David Goldsmith (2013-2017)
• Professor Albert Ong (2009-2013)
• Dr Dwomoa Adu (2007-2009)
• Professor Meguid El Nahas (2004-2007)

Case-based Meetings

Interactive video calls are held at least 4 times a year usually at 9 am GMT for 1 hour. We invite colleagues, especially trainees globally, to join these calls, giving their opinions, networking and sharing experiences. We now provide certificates for attendees and speakers to add to their portfolios for CPD. Do you have a case study that you would like to discuss on a future call? Please email the UKKA secretariat for further information.

A recent, successful initiative led by the UKKA Specialty Renal Trainees (SpRs) is a half-day educational initiative from a single country involving a high-profile UK speaker.

 

Upcoming case discussion calls - 2024

Past case discussion calls

Please visit the UKKA Education Hub here to access recordings of these past case discussions

 

Raising the profile

This is one of the current priorities of the UK Kidney Association.

A number of important initiatives are sponsored by the International Society of Nephrology (ISN) and its Core Programmes Committee. There are many opportunities for UK Nephrologists to get involved in international projects, such as the ISN Mentorship programme and the ISN Emerging Leaders programme. Other initiatives include;

The Sister Renal Centre (SRC) Program

The Sister Renal Centre (SRC) Program is chaired by Dr Chih-Wei Yang from Tiawan and Ruskhana Shroff is the Deputy Chair from the UK. The scheme encourages the pairing of “sister centres” between Supporting Centres/SC (e.g. in the UK) and Emerging Centres/EC (eg in the developing world). The SRC program has 3 levels, from C to A, according to the duration of the sorority, and also the level of activities and achievement. The benefits increase from C to A with support provided by ISN for fellowships, senior scholarships, hands-on training of paramedics and organisation of meetings between the two centres. The ISN also provides travel grants for members of the EC to attend the World Congress of Nephrology, Nexus meetings and the American Society of Nephrology. Other material support includes subscriptions to Kidney International, Nature Clinical Practice Nephrology and the online ISN educational Gateway, leading textbooks in Nephrology and Internal Medicine and educational CDs.

Current UK Sister Centre pairs are listed below. The annual deadline for applications is 30 September.

Level A

• UK (St Georges and Birmingham) – Ghana (Accra and Kumasi) JOINT
• UK (St George’s) – India (Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER)
• UK (Salford Royal Hospital) – Nigeria (University of Port Harcourt Teaching Hospital, Port Harcourt, Nigeria)

Level B

• UK (Leicester) – Nigeria (Abuja)
• UK (Birmingham) – Chile (Santiago)
• UK (Stevenage) – Nigeria (Lagos)
• UK (Oxford) – Russia (Saratov) – Belarus (Minsk) TRIO
• UK (Royal London) – Malawi (Blantyre)

Level C

• UK (Sheffield) – Bosnia (Sarajevo)

Three successful pairs have graduated from this programme: 

• UK (Guy’s) – Romania (Iasi) – 2008
• UK (Cardiff) – China (Nanjing) – 2009
• UK (Oxford) – Belarus (Minsk) – 2011
• UK (Barts Health London) - Malawi - 2019 (ISN Schrier prize winners)
• UK (Salford) - Nigeria (Port Harcourt) - 2022

 

The ISN Fellowship Program

This scheme provides an opportunity for UK kidney centres to host trainees from the developing world for up to 12 months.

Since 2002, the UK has hosted 53 ISN fellows based in 15 centres through the generous support of the ISN and Kidney Research UK. There are presently 6 ISN fellows training in the UK at 6 centres.

The UKKA has agreed to jointly sponsor a new fellowship with the ISN annually from July 2011.  The first UKKA-ISN Fellows appointed are:

2011

Name: Dr Thong Kah Mean
Number of months: 12
Home Country: Malaysia
Home Institution: Hospital Kuala Lumpur
Home Mentor: Dr. Datuk Ghazali Ahmad
Host Country: UK
Host Institution: Sheffield Kidney institute
Host Mentor: Dr. Albert CM Ong
Training Subject: Clinical (70%) – gain experience in the investigation and management of patients with inherited kidney diseases (including polycystic kidney disease)

2012

Name: Dr Ahmad Nasir Nassery
Number of Months: 12
Home Country: Pakistan
Home Institution: Northwest General Hospital and Research Center
Home Mentor: Dr Arbab Nisar Ahmad Khan
Host Country: UK
Host Institution: Hammersmith Hospital
Host Mentor: Dr Edwina Brown
Training Subject: General nephrology, hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis

2013

Name: Dr Ali Shindy 
Number of Months: 12
Home Country: Egypt
Home Institution: Wagazig University hospital
Home Mentor: Essam M Lotfy
Host Country: UK
Host Institution: UCL Center for Nephrology
Host Mentor: Mark Harber
Training Subject: Kidney Transplantation

There are two annual application deadlines (31 January and 31 July). You can register your interest to host an ISN fellow by recording your kidney centre's interest in order to be included in the ISN fellowship matching program.

Fellows are eligible to apply for membership of the UK Kidney Association, to attend the annual Kidney Research Fellows Day and for sponsored places on the UK Kidney Association Advanced Nephrology course.

ISN Memberships

The UKKA now has a special partnership with the ISN that allows UKKA members to access discounted ISN membership rates. If you have already signed up for 2023 let us know at ukka@ukkidney.org and we can arrange for the ISN to refund the difference. 

The ISN is also offering free ISN membership to all trainees under the age of 37. This is a generous offer and comes with no strings attached. The ISN is responsible for Kidney International, (access to the journal will be available through the ISN Membership) as well as discounted registration for future ISN conferences. We urge UK trainees to take this offer up.

Member in Training (FREE): Trainees in nephrology are encouraged to apply for ISN Member in Training. Members receive all member benefits except print copies of Kidney International. All other benefits apply. Eligible individuals must submit an online application. Advisors/Instructors/Professors/Supervisors of trainees in nephrology wishing to apply for In-Training Membership for their trainees can submit their applications using a dedicated application form. If submitting multiple applications, please fill in separate forms for each applicant, click here to download the application form.

ISN Fellowship Program – Advice for Applicants and Hosts in the UK

Indranil Dasgupta and John Feehally have produced a guide to hosting overseas visitors and fellows. We would urge everyone with an interest in fostering overseas links to read this document and use it where needed.

Opportunities to get involved

We encourage more UK kidney centres and nephrologists to become involved internationally, through various ISN programs. Suggestions for wider collaboration between UK centres and those in developing countries are welcome. Most members of the UKKA International Committee are experts in understanding the many tricky passages to navigate when getting permission for people from abroad to spend time in the UK being trained. So contacting them directly with queries would be a good way to start.

We are keen to promote observerships in:

1. Transplantation
2. Dialysis
3. Peritoneal Dialysis
4. Other areas

Please contact the International Committee if you would be willing to support this.

The ISN CPC Research Committee

This Committee is one of the ISN’s capacity-building programmes. It intends to build research capacity in low-resource countries and help implement research projects at a local level to detect and manage non-communicable chronic diseases such as CKD, AKI, hypertension, diabetes and cardiovascular diseases. The Clinical Research Committee also oversees the Scientific Writing Course (SWC) whose aim is to help physicians and researchers from a range of backgrounds and specialisation in nephrology to improve their scientific writing skills to enable them to publish their research work.

This programme supports collaborative research with an emphasis on the detection and management of CKD, hypertension and diabetes in developing countries. Applications for grants up to $20,000 are called for twice a year on 1April and 1 October.

The ISN CPC CME Programme

This programme brings essential teaching and training to some 14,000 doctors and health care practitioners in the emerging world annually. The CME committee is chaired by Professor Norbert Lameire and is involved in sponsoring educational nephrology programmes in the developing world.

The ISN Educational Ambassador Scheme

This scheme, chaired by Dr Gavin Dreyer (UK), seeks to match specific educational needs in developing nations to that of experts from developed nations who can offer their time and expertise on a voluntary basis. Applications can be made directly to the ISN at any time.

ISN Ambassador Programme Educational resources:

Pakistan Point of Care UltraSound (PoCUS) ISN Ambassador Program (youtube.com)

Medical Training Initiative via RCP Edinburgh

Trusts can apply to recruit via the RCPE MTI scheme - please follow this link to find out more.