The West Midlands offers many advantages of a clinical nature and academically to anyone thinking of training in renal medicine.
It is an exciting region to live in, the birthplace of Shakespeare, Rugby and 2-tone music with the surrounding areas inspiring many including JRR Tolkien and heavy metal music legends. It is a great place to live in and succeeds in striking a balance between busy urban living and quiet rural countryside.
Renal Medicine is a rewarding speciality, and encompasses many aspects of internal medicine and provides wholesome training from basic science to the ongoing care of long term patients. The West Midlands is a great place to train in Renal Medicine, with friendly, enthusiastic clinical teams. With a wide range of training centres there is plenty of opportunity to develop a specialist interest, in home-dialysis, transplantation, autoimmune renal disease, acute kidney injury, medical education and research.
Renal medicine covers the prevention, evaluation and management of all aspects of kidney disease, including the management of immune-mediated renal disease, including vasculitis and systemic lupus erythematosus, hypertension, and fluid, electrolyte and acid base disorders. Management of acute kidney injury and chronic kidney disease, and provision of renal replacement therapy forms a major element of renal medicine.
Renal trainees gain practical experience in:
- Hospital haemodialysis
- Home haemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis in the treatment of chronic renal failure
- The evaluation and selection of candidates for renal transplantation, and their pre-operative and post-operative management
- Long term follow up of renal transplant recipients
- Management of Acute Kidney injury
There is also an opportunity to train in a number of technical skills;
- Biopsy of native and transplant kidneys
- Insertion of temporary and permanent central venous catheters
- Percutaneous peritoneal dialysis catheters
- Point of care Ultrasound techniques