Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Comment
  • Published:

Beyond state borders: transforming dialysis care for undocumented immigrants

Nature Reviews Nephrology volume 19, pages 539–540 (2023)Cite this article

Subjects

An Author Correction to this article was published on 20 July 2023

This article has been updated

A lack of federal access to health-care resources for undocumented immigrants in the USA has led to variability in access to health care — including dialysis — across states. Transforming dialysis care for these individuals is justified both on humanitarian and economic grounds, but requires a roadmap for advocacy and stakeholder engagement.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on Springer Link
  • Instant access to full article PDF
Buy now

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Steps to transform dialysis access.

Change history

References

  1. Rodriguez, R., Cervantes, L. & Raghavan, R. Estimating the prevalence of undocumented immigrants with end-stage renal disease in the United States. Clin. Nephrol. 93, 108–112 (2020).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  2. Social Security. Compilation of the social security laws: payment to states. ssa.gov, https://www.ssa.gov/OP_Home/ssact/title19/1903.htm. (accessed 10 May 2023).

  3. Cervantes, L. et al. Association of emergency-only vs standard hemodialysis with mortality and health care use among undocumented immigrants with end-stage renal disease. JAMA Intern. Med. 178, 188–195 (2018).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  4. Cervantes, L. et al. The illness experience of undocumented immigrants with end-stage renal disease. JAMA Intern. Med. 177, 529–535 (2017).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  5. Cervantes, L. C. et al. The experience of primary caregivers of undocumented immigrants with end-stage kidney disease that rely on emergency-only hemodialysis. J. Gen. Intern. Med. 35, 2389–2397 (2020).

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  6. Cervantes, L. et al. Clinicians’ perspectives on providing emergency-only hemodialysis to undocumented immigrants: a qualitative study. Ann. Intern. Med. 169, 78–86 (2018).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  7. Cervantes, L., Tong, A., Camacho, C., Collings, A. & Powe, N. R. Patient-reported outcomes and experiences in the transition of undocumented patients from emergency to scheduled hemodialysis. Kidney Int. 99, 198–207 (2021).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  8. Cervantes, L., Rizzolo, K., Tummalapalli, S. L. & Powe, N. R. Economic impact of a change in Medicaid coverage policy for dialysis care of undocumented immigrants. J. Am. Soc. Nephrol. https://doi.org/10.1681/ASN.0000000000000139 (2023).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

  9. Cervantes, L., Mundo, W. & Powe, N. R. The status of provision of standard outpatient dialysis for US undocumented immigrants with ESKD. Clin. J. Am. Soc. Nephrol. 14, 1258–1260 (2019).

    Article  PubMed  PubMed Central  Google Scholar 

  10. Rizzolo, K., Dubey, M., Feldman, K. E., Powe, N. R. & Cervantes, L. Access to kidney care for undocumented immigrants across the United States. Ann. Intern. Med. 176, 877–879 (2023).

    Article  PubMed  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Surgery, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, MI, USA

    Devon Cassidy

  2. Division of Nephrology, Department of Medicine, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, CO, USA

    Katherine Rizzolo

  3. Department of Medicine, Priscilla Chan and Mark Zuckerberg San Francisco General Hospital and the University of California San Francisco, San Francisco, CA, USA

    Neil R. Powe

  4. Division of Hospital Medicine and General Internal Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, Aurora, CO, USA

    Lilia Cervantes

Authors
  1. Devon Cassidy
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Katherine Rizzolo
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Neil R. Powe
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Lilia Cervantes
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Lilia Cervantes.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Cassidy, D., Rizzolo, K., Powe, N.R. et al. Beyond state borders: transforming dialysis care for undocumented immigrants. Nat Rev Nephrol 19, 539–540 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41581-023-00738-5

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41581-023-00738-5

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing