Workshop for Information Exchange and Framework Development for Study of Epidemiological, Hydrological, and Social Factors Contributing to Chronic Kidney Disease (CKDu) in Sri Lank

研讨会将研究斯里兰卡肾病的环境控制，并探讨这些因素如何在特定的水文，地球化学和社会环境背景下相互作用，以产生当前的疾病危机。研讨会将由来自美国的多学科科学家组成的小组前往斯里兰卡，对斯里兰卡中北部的受影响地区进行为期一周的实地访问，并收集有关疫情及其环境背景的第一手资料。他们将与大学和其他政府和非政府机构的当地研究人员会面，研究和评估这一问题。他们将与当地专家举办两次讲习班。团队成员将代表多个专业领域，包括环境科学和工程，地表和地下水文学，土壤科学，地球化学，行为科学和环境心理学，地理信息系统，医学和公共卫生。其主要目标是提供评估造成这一流行病的因素的专门知识。在从广泛的角度对问题进行评估并讨论了可能导致目前状况的各种环境相互作用之后，各个学科将很好地将研究项目提交给多个机构，以解决每个机构都能解决的问题。 该项目由地球观测组织/斯里兰卡水文局、工程和环境教育局/斯里兰卡环境教育局和斯里兰卡水文局/斯里兰卡环境教育局共同资助，将审查斯里兰卡水文、工程和农业生产等复杂的环境过程，这些过程似乎有助于发生广泛的肾病。人们一致认为，这是一种与长期接触砷、镉和肾毒性农药有关的多因素疾病。还查明了其他风险因素，如浅威尔斯井中的饮用水污染以及使用杀虫剂和受污染的三重磷肥。

The workshop will examine the environmental controls on kidney disease in Sri Lanka and posit hypotheses on how these factors interact in the specific hydrologic, geochemical and social environmental settings to produce the current disease crisis. The workshop will take a multidisciplinary team of scientists from the US to Sri Lanka for a week long site field visit to the affected areas in the north central parts of Sri Lanka and gather firsthand information on the epidemic and its environmental context. They will meet with local researchers in universities and other governmental and non-governmental agencies to study and assess the problem. They will conduct two workshops with local experts. The team members will be selected to represent multiple areas of expertise including environmental sciences and engineering, surface and subsurface hydrology, soil science, geochemistry, behavioral sciences and environmental psychology, geographic information systems, medicine and public health,. The primary goal is to provide expertise on the assessment of the factors that contribute to the epidemic. Having assessed the problem from a broad perspective and discussed the various environmental interactions that could lead to the present set of conditions, the various disciplines will then be well posed to posit research project to multiple agencies to address those parts of the problems amenable to each agency. This project is jointly funded by GEO/EAR, ENG/CBET and OD/OISE.This workshop will examine the complex environmental processes of hydrology, engineering and agricultural production of Sri Lanka that appear to contribute to the occurrence of widespread kidney disease. There is the consensus that this is a multi-factorial disease related to chronic exposure to arsenic, cadmium and nephrotoxic pesticides. Additional risk factors such as drinking water contamination in shallow wells and the use of pesticides and contaminated triple phosphate fertilizer have also been identified.