The Early Symptoms of Polycystic Kidney Disease

Bigger kidney

The people in a family with a patient with PKD have more chances of getting PKD. If she or he goes to hospital and takes CT scan, she or he may find the kidney is bigger than normal size. The two kidneys tend to develop in different sizes and different speeds. In early stages, the cysts are usually small and doctors will not suggest those patients adopt any surgeries, but you can feel those cysts if you touch the back of the patients.

Flank pain

The pain in back or side is the most important symptom among patients with PKD. They usually have the feelings of pressure and dull pain in back or side, because the cysts are growing to squeeze other tissues. The pain will be deteriorated by strenuous activities, working or sitting for a long time, but if the sharp pain occurs, PKD may provoke complications such as infection or bleeding cause by cysts being broken.

High blood pressure

It is the most common and persistent symptoms of PKD. Half of those patients are destined to show high blood pressure before serum creatinine getting higher than the normal level. Scientific researches attribute it to cysts’ squeezing the surrounding tissues, activating the release of renin, angiotensin and aldosterone. The medical conditions of the patients with both PKD and high blood pressure will get worse than that of the patients only with PKD.