American Kidney Fund

What it reported doing in 2025

Public education, awareness and prevention activities: awareness and prevention35.5 million americans 1 in 7 adults have chronic kidney disease (ckd), and most don't realize they have it. Akf's education programs help individuals identify their risks for ckd and manage ckd, kidney failure and co-morbidities. A hallmark of our awareness-building work was our sixth annual kidney action week, held from march 3-7, 2025. The virtual educational event was streamed through a digital conference platform and simulcasted through akf's facebook and youtube social channels. Approximately 3,000 people preregistered for the event, with more than 150,000 people viewing the combined live and archived sessions throughout the year. We provided prevention and awareness messaging throughout the year on our social media channels, which grew to 245,000 followers in 2025.public educationwe continually enhance our education content and offerings. Our website had more than 12 million views in 2025 from people looking for kidney health information. As part of our web strategy, we continued to enrich our award-winning kidney kitchen website, a comprehensive resource for planning a kidney-friendly diet. Kidney kitchen content had nearly 2 million views in 2025. Our blog, kidney today, had more than 700,000 views of articles highlighting stories of patient experience, innovation and advocacy. We launched our first podcast, the kidney collective, with unscripted conversations giving a glimpse into the patient and caregiver experience; the podcast had more than 53,000 views on youtube. We continued our major national awareness campaign focused on reducing health disparities in kidney disease, and we held the second annual nationwide amkd awareness day to bring attention to a genetic variant that can make people of west and central african ancestry more susceptible to more severe, rapidly progressing kidney disease. We continued to run education campaigns and programs which focus on managing various aspects of kidney disease and its co-morbidities. These included the know your kidneys, know your cause, know your plan program; the kidney health for all health equity program; and the launch of our step forward education modules. We also continued to provide our kidney health coach peer-to-peer community outreach program, which now includes more than 8,000 coaches nationwide who in 2025 educated more than 27,000 people in local communities about kidney disease. For children, living with kidney disease is extremely challenging. Akf offers a free, nationwide online virtual camp program for pediatric kidney patients. The campers participate monthly in moderated activities and discussions that allow them to connect with other children around the country who are experiencing the same challenges. In 2025, nearly 150 children participated in akf's virtual camp, camp connections, which also hosted a special program for children living with cystinosis, a rare kidney disease. Akf is a strong and independent voice advocating for policies that improve access to health care and strengthen the quality of care for individuals with kidney disease. We work with congress, the administration, federal agencies, and state governments to advance legislation and regulatory policies important to kidney patients and their families. Engaging patients and caregivers around advocacy issues is central to this work. In 2025, we grew our advocacy network to over 48,000 patients and family members and provided opportunities for engagement, including two in-person congressional fly-ins, including one focused on rare kidney diseases. In november 2025 we held our third patient access initiative summit, where we focused on issues such as access to innovation, use of ai technology in treating kidney disease, as well as exploring ways to create incentives for screening and treatment to avoid or delay kidney failure. We published our fifth annual "state of the states: living donor protection report

Financial Efficiency

• Mission deployment rate: 89.6%; rating input score 90
• Program expense ratio: 95.4%; rating input score 95
• Fundraising efficiency: $34.46 raised per $1 spent on fundraising; rating input score 59; 59th percentile among comparable filings

Transparency & Controls

• Consistency checks: 89.5%; rating input score 89; 4th percentile among comparable filings
• Pay-setting controls: 5 of 6 controls in place; rating input score 83
  • Compensation committee: Pass
  • Independent consultant: Pass
  • Other Form 990s reviewed: Pass
  • Written employment contract: Missing
  • Compensation survey or study: Pass
  • Board or committee approval: Pass
• Foreign activity oversight: Limited
• Grant itemization coverage: 100%; rating input score 100; 81st percentile among comparable filings
• Major donor itemization: Yes; rating input score 100
• Related-party transparency: Limited

Accountability

• Independent voting board: 100%; rating input score 100; 65th percentile among comparable filings
• Governance controls: 9 of 9 controls in place; rating input score 100
  • Conflict-of-interest policy: Pass
  • Whistleblower policy: Pass
  • Document-retention policy: Pass
  • CEO compensation review process: Pass
  • Other executive compensation review process: Pass
  • Form 990 shared with the board: Pass
  • Board meeting minutes documented: Pass
  • Audit committee oversight: Pass
  • Independent financial-statement audit: Pass

Sustainability

• Operating margin: 6.8%; rating input score 61; 61st percentile among comparable filings
• Total-asset coverage ratio: 0.66; rating input score 20; 20th percentile among comparable filings
• Liabilities to assets ratio: 0.05; rating input score 82; 82nd percentile among comparable filings
• Officer compensation ratio: 1.4%; rating input score 71; 71st percentile among comparable filings

Growth

• Program expense growth: 1.7% per year; rating input score 100; 17th percentile among comparable filings
• Revenue growth: 3.5% per year; rating input score 100; 28th percentile among comparable filings
• Asset growth: 15.2% per year; rating input score 100; 86th percentile among comparable filings