Dialysis at Yours: Life Fulfilled (DAYLife) – Enabling more people to dialyse from home
Author: Udaya Udayaraj
Home dialysis offers the benefits of flexibility and better quality of life for most people and cost-effectiveness for the NHS compared to in-centre haemodialysis. Home dialysis also offers a potential solution to meet the increasing demands on in-centre dialysis capacity. However, the proportion of patients on home dialysis has remained unchanged over the last decade with wide and often unwarranted variation between centres.
Following a successful pilot in the Midlands in 2019, the DAYLife project was relaunched in 2023 as a national quality improvement programme to improve the uptake and quality of home dialysis. It is a partnership between KQIP, the UKKA, Fresenius Medical Care, Kidney Care UK and the National Kidney Federation.
The main objectives of the programme are to:
- engage kidney centres in undertaking quality improvement initiatives on home dialysis
- support centres with the required skills, including improvement methodology
- learning and sharing best practices from centres achieving a high home dialysis prevalence rate
In addition, the national programme has workstreams on shared haemodialysis care, peer support, and psychosocial support focused on developing national resources, enabling centres and networks to develop local leadership and services in these areas.
The shared haemodialysis care mentoring programme is one such project due to be completed in March 2026, where five experienced centres are mentoring other centres in developing their shared care programme. Insights from this mentorship project will be incorporated into a future home dialysis mentoring programme due to be rolled out in 2026. The regional peer support service model supported by Kidney Care UK in London and the Northeast kidney networks is an example of regional collaboration to develop sustainable services when resources are limited.
The DAYLife knowledge hub can be accessed via the UKKA’s Education Hub website.
This is an interactive knowledge and resource platform developed by the project team to support teams and consists of three sections:
- Resources - published evidence from QI initiatives and links to additional resources to help guide your practice
- Contribute – a platform to showcase and share your centre’s experiences on quality improvement projects related to home dialysis
- Connect – opportunity to join the DAYLife community and get involved in discussions and ask your peers for advice and support
A series of webinars and face-to-face events have been held since 2023. These have included the sharing and learning from QI initiatives across the country, as well as expert speakers and interactive discussions focusing on specific areas of improvement. These areas of improvement consist of the development of a shared care patient charter, national peer support accreditation service and toolkit, and psychosocial training for staff. Recordings and presentations from these webinars and other DAYLife events can be accessed here.
The next DAYLife event will be the Home Dialysis Summit on 29 September 2025 in Birmingham, focusing on how centres and kidney networks have scaled up their home dialysis programme to meet the GIRFT target. Registration link and full agenda can be found here.
If you would like to get involved with the DAYLife programme, or receive support from our Programme Team on home dialysis QI initiatives, please contact Dr Udaya Udayaraj or Georgina Hamill.