Chronic kidney and vascular diseases are emerging as a major global-health threat. The urgent need to develop strategies for early detection of chronic kidney diseases and to implement measures to prevent progression was the object of a symposium organised by Paul E de Jong from Groningen, Netherlands, and the International Society of Nephrology (ISN) in Amsterdam, in mid-November, 2004. This meeting was the last of a series of ISN conferences, which started in March, 2004, with a ground-breaking meeting at the Bellagio Study and Conference Centre of the Rockefeller Foundation and then continued with international conferences in Hong Kong, Toronto, and New York.

Worldwide, more than 60 million individuals are estimated to have some degree of chronic kidney disease, and the burden may double in the next 10 years. 1 The rise in the prevalence of type 2 diabetes, a disease that is often complicated by kidney disease, is expected to significantly contribute to the burden of chronic kidney disease. 2 Most of these patients with kidney malfunction succumb to cardiovascular events while others will develop endstage renal disease (ESRD), which requires expensive renal replacement therapy. Currently more than a million people are on dialysis, 90% living in Europe, North America, and Japan. 3