New programme targets better diagnosis, treatment for children with kidney disease 

The Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation (GPHC) has launched a new collaboration aimed at strengthening paediatric kidney care services in Guyana with an international grant from the University of Calgary, Canada, under the International Society of Nephrology (ISN).
The US$6000 grant was awarded in February 2026 under the ISN Sister Renal Centers Programme.
The initiative was announced on World Kidney Day on Thursday and is a partnership between GPHC, the University of Calgary in Canada and the International Society of Nephrology. The programme is being funded through a competitive grant awarded by the global nephrology body to help build paediatric nephrology capacity in developing health systems.
Guyana’s paediatric nephrologist, Dr Areefa Alladin, said the project will focus on establishing comprehensive services for children with kidney disease while expanding diagnostic and treatment capabilities at the hospital. She noted that there will be a team of trained medical professionals who will collaboratively work to provide specialised care for young patients.
“This grant is a two-year grant that will be renewable for up to six years… Our goal is to build a multidisciplinary chronic kidney disease paediatric consultation team at the Georgetown Public Hospital using that model of working collaboratively with healthcare professionals, including physicians, nurses, pharmacists, social workers, dieticians, psychologists, and all other partners who will help us to provide comprehensive care for children. We plan to train people who are going to help us to build this team within those collaborative efforts,” she said.
According to Dr Alladin, plans include developing kidney pathology, expanding immunology testing, and training specialists to conduct kidney biopsies and other essential diagnostic procedures.
“We also plan to increase diagnostic capacity by building immunology studies and immunology testing that is timely and appropriate and building a kidney pathology service where we train people to do kidney biopsies,” she added.

Create a national registry
Dr Alladin said the programme will create a national registry of children diagnosed with kidney disease to help doctors better understand the prevalence of the condition and intervene earlier.
“At the end of these two years, we want to have a registry of all children diagnosed with kidney disease in this country, enrol them into this registry, have their kidney function assessed, stratify their risk of progression to kidney disease, know what the cause of their kidney disease is, and implement measures to slow, prevent, or stop their kidney disease progression,” she explained.
Another key component of the initiative is the development of treatment tailored specifically for children, and according to Dr Alladin, while haemodialysis is widely used, peritoneal dialysis may be more suitable for paediatric patients because it allows them to maintain a normal daily routine.
She noted, “We want to train nurses in paediatric PD, and we want to have automated peritoneal dialysis so that children could be plugged into a machine at night, have their dialysis while they’re asleep, and go to school and have play and live a normal life during the day. We also know that peritoneal dialysis will not be applicable to all kids.”
However, she acknowledged that some children may still require haemodialysis, making it necessary to train specialised nurses to run this and establish protocols for both forms of treatment.

Work closely with local doctors
Supporting this initiative is Dr Jullian Midgley, a paediatric nephrologist from the University of Calgary with more than three decades of experience, who said the Canadian institution will serve as a mentor centre for the programme. He added that specialists from Calgary will work closely with local doctors through periodic visits and regular virtual meetings to guide the programme’s development.
“We’re going to support Dr Aladdin as a mentor centre from Canada, Calgary, in her establishment of a full-service paediatric nephrology section within this hospital serving the children of Guyana and later, as you heard, in the Caribbean.” He also said, “We’ll be visiting from time to time, but more importantly, we’ll be having monthly meetings by Zoom to discuss progress, see what we can assist with, and give her guidance.”
Chief Executive Officer of the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation, Robbie Rambarran, praised the partnership and emphasised the importance of strengthening paediatric kidney care in the country.
He noted that more than 100 children are currently registered as living with kidney disease in Guyana.
Rambarran said the hospital is committed to expanding nephrology services and improving outcomes for patients.
“This programme is a very important one to us. While we are having several discussions about how we are delivering dialysis and the whole nephrology care for our adult patients, this new component will now play a part, and all these developments of new policies and protocols will work collectively in both adults and paediatrics.”