Published October 2005

Kidney center offers
life-sustaining treatment

Photo by Linda Thomas Puget Sound Kidney Centers opened its Smokey Point facility in March. The building, with more than 16,000 square feet of space and located on more than 67,000 square feet of land, cost about $4 million.

By Linda Thomas
Special to SCBJ

Monroe resident Mary Swanson doesn’t go anywhere without her phone. She’s waiting for a call that will save her life.

For the past year and a half, Swanson, 44, has been on the waiting list for a kidney transplant. More than 800 other people in Washington also are waiting for a “kidney call,” as Swanson refers to it.

During a check-up six years ago, her doctor ran a blood test and discovered Swanson’s kidneys were failing.

“I thought she had to be wrong,” Swanson recalled. “I felt perfectly fine.”

More tests and opinions from other doctors confirmed the diagnosis.

Now Swanson, who like many people knew very little about what her kidneys did, endures four-hour dialysis treatments three days a week.

Dialysis machines do mechanically what a human’s two kidneys do naturally. The most basic function of a kidney is to filter blood. Waste from the bean-shaped organ is eliminated through urine, while clean blood goes back into the bloodstream.

“At first I thought, ‘Why me, God?’ Now, I’m just thankful that medical technology exists to keep me alive. If it wasn’t for dialysis, I would have died,” said Swanson.

“Dialysis doesn’t save a life, but it does sustain it,” said Harold Kelly, president and chief executive of Puget Sound Kidney Centers. He said people who take care of their health can live for three or four decades on dialysis.

The need for kidney dialysis is increasing, locally and nationally.

According to the National Kidney Foundation, about 20 million Americans — one out of nine — have kidney disease. Most don’t know they have it. Common causes for kidney failure include obesity, adult-onset diabetes and high blood pressure.

The nonprofit Puget Sound Kidney Centers provides dialysis for about 400 patients in locations such as Everett, Mountlake Terrace, Oak Harbor and, most recently, Smokey Point, where a new facility opened earlier this year.

Kelly went through an extensive ZIP-code analysis of current patients to find the most convenient location for a new treatment center, plus adequate space for parking for patients and their families.

“We took a large geographic area, and then I started driving around in the car to find a good place,” he said.

Kelly looked for a spot that was close to freeways and bus routes, criteria that fit perfectly with land he found north of Smokey Point.

The agency’s new Smokey Point center — a brick building of 16,416 square feet on 67,383 square feet of land — opened in March. The new center, at 18828 Smokey Point Blvd., cost about $4 million.

The federal government pays 80 percent of the cost of kidney dialysis treatments for most patients, and many people have private health insurance or state medical aid to help cover their costs.

Kelly said his job is to run a “highly efficient” organization so the nonprofit can afford to pay for the new Smokey Point building and plan for future growth in Snohomish County.

While he’s proud of the Smokey Point complex, he’s more impressed by the people who work for Puget Sound Kidney Centers.

“We hire a great staff and train them well,” he said. “Our training regimen has become a model for others, and that’s important because the staff will see these patients for years.”

Kelly’s empathy for patients and their families comes from a personal experience with kidney disease. His mother died of kidney failure.

“She had great care,” he added. “I want to make sure our clients do, too. I’m always reminding my staff to ‘put yourself in the patient’s shoes.’ ”

Linda Thomas is a free-lance writer based in Seattle.

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