Southern California Ending Disparities in CKD Leadership Summit

Table of Contents

About the Initiative

The Ending Disparities in CKD Leadership Summit convenes stakeholders to identify strategies and solutions across sectors to equitably increase early diagnosis and management of CKD. 

In 2024, NKF convened 59 stakeholders in the Bay Area and generated 13 recommendations. In 2025 NKF aims to convene stakeholders in Southern California to build on momentum generated from the Bay Area Summit, determine how to advance statewide strategies (policy change, coalitions, etc.), and create tailored strategies to serve the unique needs of local communities in Southern California.

The Southern California Summit will be a virtual convening in June 2025 (date is still to be determined). 

Summit Process

Land Acknowledgement

While we refer to Southern California, we recognize that this region stands upon the ancestral and unceded territories of the Chumash, Alliklik, Kitanemuk, Serrano, Tongva, Luiseño, Cahuilla, Cupeño, Chemehuevi, Kumeyaay, and Tactic peoples. We recognize both the historical and ongoing injustices experienced by Indigenous communities—including the impacts of settler-colonization and genocide—as well as their resilience and achievements.

In the spirit of continuous learning and accountability, we humbly offer the following resources for further exploration:

Learning and Action Workgroups

Through a series of facilitated discussions, occurring in 2025, stakeholders will identify barriers and solutions to improve CKD awareness, detection, and management in the Bay Area, and especially tools and strategies that can be implemented within stakeholders' own institutions. Four workgroups will convene covering the following topics:

Clinical Considerations for CKD in Primary Care

  • Goal: Discuss and develop strategies and approaches that can be employed to improve CKD recognition and care in primary care settings.
  • Background: A large, national study illustrated that less than 12% of people with CKD were diagnosed in primary care. This included as many as 40% of people whose kidneys required specialty care. With the advent of new therapies demonstrated to slow or stop the progression of CKD, there is a very real opportunity to improve quality of care for people with CKD across the entire disease spectrum.
  •  Structure and Timeline: Three, 90-minute Zoom meetings in Feb/Mar 2025
    • Meeting 1: Identifying barriers 
    • Meeting 2: Identifying solutions 
    • Meeting 3: Putting solutions into actionable strategies
  • Targeted participants (regional stakeholders are welcome to attend):
    • Physicians
    • Physician Assistants
    • Nurses
    • Health System Leadership
    • FQHCs
    • Health Care Associations
    • Labs
    • Medical Directors
    • Chief Medical Officers
    • Professional Membership Associations

Community-Centered Engagement and Solutions

  • Goal: Develop strategies to advance CKD awareness through community engagement and to ensure that health care providers are aware of the community resources available to delay CKD progression. 
  • Background:  In the U.S., only 10% of individuals with laboratory-confirmed CKD are aware they have the condition. Improving patient awareness, engagement, and self-management is crucial for slowing CKD progression. Since diabetes and hypertension are major contributors to CKD, partnering with community organizations that support people with these chronic conditions is essential for raising awareness of CKD among those at risk.
  • Structure and Timeline: Three, 90-minute zoom meetings in February/March 2025
    • Meeting 1: Identifying Barriers 
    • Meeting 2: Identifying Solutions 
    • Meeting 3: Putting Solutions into Action
  • Targeted participants (regional stakeholders are welcome to attend):
    • Community Leaders
    • Non-profits
    • Health centered organizations/businesses
    • Faith communities 
    • Health Equity Leadership

Chronic Disease Prevention and Wellness Listening Tour

  • Goals:
    • Align with/ support broader population health and policy, systems, and environmental change efforts
    • Develop shared messaging and health promotion or wellness programs
  • Background: One of the key themes from the Bay Area Summit’s roadmap is to identify opportunities for disease agnostic interventions and upstream prevention of chronic disease. The National Kidney Foundation (NKF) recognizes that collaboration is an essential component to effectively address the interconnected risk-factors of cardiovascular-kidney-metabolic syndrome and related chronic diseases. To strengthen our impact through mission-aligned partnerships, the NKF team is launching a Listening Tour in California. This will involve engaging with chronic disease prevention organizations to learn about their work, explore alignment, and assess opportunities for the NKF to amplify our shared goals and improve the health of our communities.
  • Structure and Timeline:
    • NKF is meeting with various organizations and coalitions on an ongoing basis until the final summit in June 2025
  • Objectives:
    • Learn about the organization and their work
    • Identify opportunities for alignment
    • Considerations for partnership
  • Organizations/ Coalitions to engage (both regional and statewide groups): 
    • Local public health departments
    • Chronic disease organizations 
    • Wellness organizations 

Payer Roundtable

  • Goals:
    • Convene payers (health plans, employers, state agencies) to discuss prioritization and alignment on quality measures that will improve chronic disease care and outcomes, including CKD testing. 
    • Review clinical and financial evidence associated with improved CKD testing and recognition to leverage the argument for inclusion to Medi-Cal
    • Identify areas of opportunity to work across the broader health system in California to support the improvement of chronic disease outcomes, building on the recommendations generated during the Bay Area summit.
  • Background: During the Bay Area summit, stakeholders highlighted the challenges of the current quality improvement landscape in health care. Efforts to improve quality have resulted in a large number of quality measures, which stretch the capacity and bandwidth of care providers. Attempts to streamline quality measures have been helpful to reduce competing priorities, but can make it difficult to bring visibility and focus into areas like CKD that are not explicitly called out on current measure sets (despite having impacts on outcomes of current measures). There are also issues with reimbursement and payment models, especially in FQHC and safety net settings, that can make it difficult to appropriately address the underlying patient needs that can impact quality improvement outcomes. Attendees will discuss these challenges and opportunities and work to find tangible solutions to address these challenges, and generate a state level payer roadmap.
  • Structure and Timeline:
    • Two hour virtual meeting to be held April/May 2025
    • Final summit convening June 2025
  • Targeted participants (both regional and statewide payers are welcome to attend): 
    • Payers
    • Health plans
    • Employers
    • Medi-Cal
    • Employee Benefits
    • Insurers

Ways to Get Involved

  • Participate in a workgroup discussion 
  • Connect us with organizations in your community who may be interested in the Summit 
  • Attend and/or spread the word about the Summit 

If you are interested in participating in the Summit and/or have any questions, please reach out to: