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. 2022 Apr;26(4):360-367.
doi: 10.1007/s10157-021-02163-z. Epub 2022 Jan 1.

Tracing all patients who received insured dialysis treatment in Japan and the present situation of their number of deaths

Shinichiro Kubo  1 , Tatsuya Noda  2 , Tomoya Myojin  1 , Yuichi Nishioka  1 , Saho Kanno  1 , Tsuneyuki Higashino  3 , Masatoshi Nishimoto  4 , Masahiro Eriguchi  4 , Kenichi Samejima  4 , Kazuhiko Tsuruya  4 , Tomoaki Imamura  1
Affiliations

Tracing all patients who received insured dialysis treatment in Japan and the present situation of their number of deaths

Shinichiro Kubo et al. Clin Exp Nephrol. 2022 Apr.

Abstract

Background: The survival rate of chronic dialysis patients in Japan remains the highest worldwide, so there is value in presenting Japan's situation internationally. We examined whether aggregate figures on dialysis patients in the National Database of Health Insurance Claims and Special Health Checkups of Japan (NDB), which contains data on insured procedures of approximately 100 million Japanese residents, complement corresponding figures in the Japanese Society for Dialysis Therapy Renal Data Registry (JRDR).

Methods: Subjects were patients with medical fee points for dialysis recorded in the NDB during 2014-2018. We analyzed annual numbers of dialysis cases, newly initiated dialysis cases- and deaths.

Results: Compared with the JRDR, the NDB had about 6-7% fewer dialysis cases but a similar number of newly initiated dialysis cases. In the NDB, the number of deaths was about 6-10% lower, and the number of hemodialysis cases was lower, while that of peritoneal dialysis cases was higher. The cumulative survival rate at dialysis initiation was approximately 6 percentage points lower in the NDB than in the JRDR, indicating that some patients die at dialysis initiation. Cumulative survival rate by age group was roughly the same between the NDB and JRDR in both sexes.

Conclusion: The use of the NDB enabled us to aggregate data of dialysis patients. With the definition of dialysis patients used in this study, analyses of concomitant medications, comorbidities, surgeries, and therapies will become possible, which will be useful in many future studies.

Keywords: Administrative claims database; Chronic renal insufficiency; NDB; National database; Peritoneal dialysis.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have declared that no conflict of interest exists.

Figures

Fig. 1
Fig. 1
Five-year survival curves of patients who initiated dialysis between January 2014 and December 2014
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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