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In the United States, Western Europe and Japan, there is widespread access to dialysis, most of it publicly funded. But in many countries, the majority of patients who need dialysis die without it.

I was on dialysis three times a week for four and a half hours each time.

It was in 2003 that I realised there was no choice but to have dialysis treatment - by the time of the World Cup that year, I could barely walk. A year later, I finally had a kidney transplant.

I'd sometimes fly for 14 hours, then go straight to dialysis. I spent a little time being tired, but we managed. I'm not a pity-party person.

I was on dialysis for 18 months before the transplant, so it was important I tried to look ahead to days like my comeback this Saturday. You need those big goals to drive you on.

I was in the hospital for about two weeks because I had some complications due to the transition to kidney from dialysis and getting off of that.

We used to have to arrange things around the dialysis. I would have to plan where to play so I could be back in time, and couldn't go too far.

If you don't have dialysis, absolutely, you will die. Dialysis is actually keeping me alive.

We had a big controversy in the United States when there was a limited number of dialysis machines. In Seattle, they appointed what they called a 'God committee' to choose who should get it, and that committee was eventually abandoned. Society ended up paying the whole bill for dialysis instead of having people make those decisions.