Almost every patient advocacy organization says it speaks for patients. Far fewer can show that no one with a financial stake in patients’ care is paying for the microphone. This page shows the difference with public facts, so you can judge for yourself.
Patient advocacy groups are not required to report the money they receive from drug and device companies the way doctors’ payments are reported. Researchers and journalists had to dig to find it.
Where the money comes from decides whose interests sit at the table, often without anyone saying a word.
Funding flows in from companies that profit from patients’ care. The organization’s voice flows out to patients and policymakers.
No donations, and no funding from drugmakers, device makers, dialysis organizations or the advocacy groups they fund. We charge fees only for services you request, at posted rates, and fees never buy influence. Lived experience, evidence, and free tools flow out.
Ten well-known U.S. advocacy organizations in kidney care, caregiving, and patient advocacy. Every one presents itself as a voice for patients or caregivers. Here is what is publicly documented about who funds them.
These organizations do real and often valuable work, and accepting industry funding is legal and common. We list them because their funding relationships are a matter of public record, from their own websites and disclosures or from published reporting, so you can weigh what each voice may be unable to say. Facts as of the dates of the sources cited below.
Major donations from the two largest dialysis companies, DaVita and Fresenius, reported at roughly 80% of the Fund’s donor base. A whistleblower lawsuit alleged those donations amounted to illegal kickbacks.
Dialysis-industry fundedSources [3]Its 2026 corporate membership program lists drugmakers including Boehringer Ingelheim, Novo Nordisk, Vertex, AstraZeneca, Novartis, and GlaxoSmithKline. Dialysis provider Fresenius has publicized its fundraising support.
Pharma & dialysis supportedSources [4]Its corporate membership program lists industry partners including Amgen, AstraZeneca, Baxter, Bayer, DaVita, and Fresenius Medical Care.
Industry corporate partnersSources [5]Founded in 2004 with an educational grant from dialysis provider DaVita, and originally named “DaVita Patient Citizens.” Its own fact sheet says the later name change better represents its “independent spirit of governance.”
Founded with dialysis fundingSources [6]Its corporate partners page lists drugmakers including Pfizer, Astellas, Eisai, Teva, Viatris, and Novartis as members of its Corporate Leadership Council.
Pharma corporate partnersSources [7]A U.S. Senate Finance Committee inquiry found drugmakers gave the alliance nearly $23 million from 2006 to 2008, about three-quarters of its donations.
Pharma funded (documented)Sources [8]Named by KFF Health News among the well-known recipients in its database of drugmaker donations to patient groups.
Pharma donations recordedSources [2]To its credit, it publishes its own disclosure: drug, biotech, and device companies provided about 5% of its total revenue in fiscal 2024–2025.
Pharma & device funded (disclosed)Sources [9]The drug industry trade group PhRMA gave it more than $1.8 million from 2009 to 2016, according to Associated Press reporting. Its executive director led an affiliated Washington lobbying and PR firm.
Pharma trade-group fundedSources [10]Described by KFF Health News as having multiple pharmaceutical sponsors while advocating for access to new drugs.
Pharma sponsoredSources [11]Accepts no donations, and no funding, gifts, grants or sponsorships of any kind from drug, biologic, medical-device or pharmaceutical companies, dialysis organizations, insurers, hospital systems, or any advocacy organization funded by them. Charges fees only for services you request, at posted rates, and fees never buy influence. There is no sponsor to protect, so every institution can be named.
$0 from industry or donorsOur storyIndependence isn’t a feeling or a slogan. It shows up in five places you can check.
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