Hemodialysis system privatization and patient survival: a report from a large registry Eastern Europe cohort.

Background: There has been a rapid increase in incident and prevalent rates of hemodialysis (HD) patients in Romania following the 2004 system privatization, but little is known about the impact of privatization on patient outcomes.

Methods: We retrospectively examined the outcome during 1 year of 8161 prevalent HD patients registered in the Romanian Renal Registry at 31 December 2011. Standardized mortality ratio (SMR) was calculated for each for-profit (FP) and non-profit (NP) HD provider.