Based at the Royal Adelaide Hospital, Stephen McDonald is Director of Dialysis and a Senior Staff Nephrologist at The Central Northern Renal and Transplantation Service (based at the Royal Adelaide Hospital), and Clinical Director of Renal Services for the Country Health region of SA Health. He is Executive Officer of the Australia and New Zealand Dialysis and Transplant Registry, and holds academic status as Clinical Professor in the Department of Medicine of the University of Adelaide, and Principal Research Fellow in the SA Health and Medical Research Institute. Following clinical training in nephrology at various hospitals in Adelaide, he moved to the world of epidemiological research at Menzies School of Health Research in Darwin in 1998. There he examined relationships between early kidney and cardiovascular disease and markers of inflammation and nutrition among remote Aboriginal communities. He also spent time as a general physician to a number of remote Aboriginal communities. Later he returned to Adelaide to a post-doctoral position in the ANZDATA Registry, and ultimately staff nephrologist post with the Dept of Nephrology & Transplantation Service at The Queen Elizabeth Hospital and more recently in the amalgamated Central Northern Adelaide Renal and Transplantation Service at the Royal Adelaide Hospital. He retains a substantial interest in non-metropolitan renal services in his role as Clinical Director for Renal Services for County Health SA; he also provides the renal transplant assessment service in Alice Springs and Darwin. As a clinician, his practice includes care for in- and out-patients with all types of kidney disease including acute and chronic kidney disease, people receiving all forms of dialysis and those with kidney transplants.