Polycystic Kidney Disease of treatment

Polycystic Kidney Disease (PKD or PCKD, also known as polycystic kidney syndrome) is a cystic genetic disorder of the kidneys
Although a cure for autosomal dominant PKD is not available, treatment can ease symptoms and prolong life.
Pain. Pain in the area of the kidneys can be caused by cyst infection, bleeding into cysts, kidney stone, or stretching of the fibrous tissue around the kidney with cyst growth. A doctor will first evaluate which of these causes are contributing to the pain to guide treatment. If it is determined to be chronic pain due to cyst expansion, the doctor may initially suggest over-the-counter pain medications, such as aspirin or acetaminophen (Tylenol). Consult your doctor before taking any over-the-counter medication because some may be harmful to the kidneys. For most but not all cases of severe pain due to cyst expansion, surgery to shrink cysts can relieve pain in the back and sides. However, surgery provides only temporary relief and does not slow the disease's progression toward kidney failure.
Headaches that are severe or that seem to feel different from other headaches might be caused by aneurysms-blood vessels that balloon out in spots-in the brain. These aneurysms could rupture, which can have severe consequences. Headaches also can be caused by high blood pressure. People with autosomal dominant PKD should see a doctor if they have severe or recurring headaches-even before considering over-the-counter pain medications.
Urinary tract infections. People with autosomal dominant PKD tend to have frequent urinary tract infections, which can be treated with antibiotics. People with the disease should seek treatment for urinary tract infections immediately because infection can spread from the urinary tract to the cysts in the kidneys. Cyst infections are difficult to treat because many antibiotics do not penetrate the cysts.
High blood pressure. Keeping blood pressure under control can slow the effects of autosomal dominant PKD. Lifestyle changes and various medications can lower high blood pressure. Patients should ask their doctors about such treatments. Sometimes proper diet and exercise are enough to keep blood pressure controlled.
End-stage renal disease. After many years, PKD can cause the kidneys to fail. Because kidneys are essential for life, people with ESRD must seek one of two options for replacing kidney functions: dialysis or transplantation. In hemodialysis, blood is circulated into an external filter, where it is cleaned before re-entering the body; in peritoneal dialysis, a fluid is introduced into the abdomen, where it absorbs wastes and is then removed. Transplantation of healthy kidneys into ESRD patients has become a common and successful procedure. Healthy-non-PKD-kidneys transplanted into PKD patients do not develop cysts.
Although a cure for autosomal dominant PKD is not available, treatment can ease symptoms and prolong life.
Pain. Pain in the area of the kidneys can be caused by cyst infection, bleeding into cysts, kidney stone, or stretching of the fibrous tissue around the kidney with cyst growth. A doctor will first evaluate which of these causes are contributing to the pain to guide treatment. If it is determined to be chronic pain due to cyst expansion, the doctor may initially suggest over-the-counter pain medications, such as aspirin or acetaminophen (Tylenol). Consult your doctor before taking any over-the-counter medication because some may be harmful to the kidneys. For most but not all cases of severe pain due to cyst expansion, surgery to shrink cysts can relieve pain in the back and sides. However, surgery provides only temporary relief and does not slow the disease's progression toward kidney failure.
Headaches that are severe or that seem to feel different from other headaches might be caused by aneurysms-blood vessels that balloon out in spots-in the brain. These aneurysms could rupture, which can have severe consequences. Headaches also can be caused by high blood pressure. People with autosomal dominant PKD should see a doctor if they have severe or recurring headaches-even before considering over-the-counter pain medications.
Urinary tract infections. People with autosomal dominant PKD tend to have frequent urinary tract infections, which can be treated with antibiotics. People with the disease should seek treatment for urinary tract infections immediately because infection can spread from the urinary tract to the cysts in the kidneys. Cyst infections are difficult to treat because many antibiotics do not penetrate the cysts.
High blood pressure. Keeping blood pressure under control can slow the effects of autosomal dominant PKD. Lifestyle changes and various medications can lower high blood pressure. Patients should ask their doctors about such treatments. Sometimes proper diet and exercise are enough to keep blood pressure controlled.
End-stage renal disease. After many years, PKD can cause the kidneys to fail. Because kidneys are essential for life, people with ESRD must seek one of two options for replacing kidney functions: dialysis or transplantation. In hemodialysis, blood is circulated into an external filter, where it is cleaned before re-entering the body; in peritoneal dialysis, a fluid is introduced into the abdomen, where it absorbs wastes and is then removed. Transplantation of healthy kidneys into ESRD patients has become a common and successful procedure. Healthy-non-PKD-kidneys transplanted into PKD patients do not develop cysts.

How Do I Recovery from Polycystic Kidney Disease

This is a real story of my patients.

“I will never forget you, dear.” Ellis replied tearfully, “you are my only in this world”. Hearing this word, I could hardly repress my tears……

I am a young lady with Polycystic Kidney Disease, a genetic kidney disease. I knew I have the potential to get this disease from my childhood. However, when it came that day, I found it is so hard for me to accept this fact. After being diagnosed with Polycystic Kidney Disease, I spend a long time to think about myself, Ellis, and our future. I love Ellis, my smart and handsome husband, and I do not want him to feel sad, but facing this fact, what I can do?

After the fierce ideological struggle, in one morning, I mustered up my courage to told Ellis I have Polycystic Kidney Disease. I hoped he can forget me, however, after hearing his words, I decided to do everything possible to live……

From that day on, I tried every means to treat my disease; however, disappointingly, cysts have never ceased to enlarging. Even so, I will not give up. This month, when I arrived at  Kidney Disease Hospital, my life was changed. I was given Chinese medicine which I do not quite believe before as the major treatment. A week later, I did another examination about my cysts, and when I glanced at the reports, I was shocked. I could hardly breathe. One of my cysts should shrink to 52*45mm mm from 55*46mm. I could not believe what I saw. In order to confirm the authenticity of this report, I did examination again. The fact is the result of two examination reports is same and this time I know I find the chance to lengnow my life.

Do You Know the Signs of Diabetic Nephropathy

Firstly, Diabetics may get up for the bathroom more often at night.

As we know, normal people have more urine in the day than that at night. The things will change if the renal tubules are damaged and the function of concentration decrease, which is a sign of pathological changes in the kidneys.

Secondly, proteinuria is also an earliest sign of  Diabetic Nephropathy.

Albumin in the urine presents long before the usual tests done in your doctor's office which can show evidence of kidney disease, so it is vital for diabetic patients to do a regular check more often. The glomerular filtration rate (GFR) begins to decrease if the proteinuria lasts for a long period, and degree of the disease also closely relates to the quantity of the proteinuria.

Thirdly, High blood pressure is also one of the main symptoms of Diabetic Nephropathy. Among the patients with Type 1 Diabetes, the morbidity of Hypertension is same with that among normal people, while the patients with Type 2 Diabetes may suffer a higher risk of getting high blood pressure. In addition, patients with proteinuria are also easily to get Hypertension.

Fourthly, here are some other signs of Kidney Disease in patients with Diabetes, and you can scan them and check yourself.

1. Ankle and leg swelling, leg cramps

2. High levels of BUN and creatinine in blood

3. Less need for insulin or antidiabetic medications

4. Morning sickness, nausea and vomiting

5. Weakness, paleness and anemia

6. Itching

In the early stage, the signs are mainly about the decrease of renal function, for example, proteinuria, swelling, renal failure and anemia.

What is Creatinine?

Creatinine is the metabolic waste of muscle in our body which is mainly be excreted through glomeruli, and each 20mg muscle can produce one milligram creatinine each day. Creatinine can be produced both internally and externally. On one hand, the meat we ingest is the main source of external creatinine, while on the other, the metabolism of muscle is of the internal one. The level of creatinine will be constant if the meat intake and metabolism of muscle are steady.

● What can we expect from the level of creatinine?

Clinically, creatinine is a key factor when doing a test to know the function of kidneys. How does creatinine form and get out of the body? We have learned from the above that the internal creatinine comes from muscle. It is formed gradually during the irreversible non-enzyme dehydration, and then it is released into blood before excreted via urine. Therefore, creatinine level is close related to the amount of muscle in the body instead to the diet.

In addition, all the creatinine can be excreted out of the body no matter what the quantity of urine is, this is due to the fact that creatinine is such a micro molecule that it can easily get through the glomeruli. If the renal function is damaged, the creatinine can not pass the glomeruli freely, which will cause the accumulation of it in the body and be harmful to human body. The more the creatinine gathered, the severe the disease is. That is why we say that the creatinine level is an important factor to judge what degree the disease is in.

● What is the normal level of creatinine?

In the United States, creatinine is typically reported in mg/dL, whereas, in Canada and a few European countries, μmol/litre may be used. 1 mg/dL of creatinine is 88.4μmol/L.

The typical human reference ranges for creatinine are 0.5 to 1.0 mg/dL (about 45-90 μmol/L) for women and 0.7 to 1.2 mg/dL (60-110 μmol/L) for men. While a baseline creatinine of 2.0 mg/dL (150μmol/L) may indicate normal kidney function in a male body builder, a creatinine of 1.2 mg/dL (110μmol/L) can indicate significant renal disease in an elderly female. For male reference range are 60-120 μmol/L and for female it is 50-110 μmol/L (Ref: Australian Medicine Handbook)

Is Multiple Renal Cyst Same with Polycystic Kidney Disease

As one of the most common kidney diseases, Multiple Renal Cyst can occur in people with any ages. Most of the cysts are small and do not have any discomfort, however, there will appear some symptoms if the cysts are larger than 5cm, such as pain in the waist, frequent micturition, urgent urination, odynuria, hematuria.
Nevertheless, Multiple Renal Cyst is not the same with Polycystic Kidney Disease, and there are great differences between them.
The causes and the pathological changes are different. Polycystic Kidney Disease is a kind of autosomal inherited disease, while Multiple Renal Cyst can be inherited or the consequence of wounds, inflammatory reaction, tumour and so on.
Family history is an important factor. There must be some other people who have got similar disease in the family of a patient with Polycystic Kidney Disease, but the patient with Multiple Renal Cyst may not have this problem.
Substance in the cysts are not the same. Urine can always be found in the cysts of Polycystic Kidney Disease, however, the cysts of Multiple Renal Cyst may contain body fluid which is look like plasma and includes red blood cells in it.
Complications are different. Patients with Polycystic Kidney Disease have to suffer from many other diseases, such as Hypertension, Renal Insufficiency, and Uremia, but generally speaking, Multiple Renal Cyst has little risk to have these severe complications.
Prevention of the two kinds of disease need to be done from different aspects. Cysts in Polycystic Kidney Disease can be restrained as well as remit the symptoms, while the other one can remove the cyst if it does not have a big size.

What is the Most Effective Way to Lower Creatinine Level?

It is easy for the patients to get various medicines with the function of decrease the creatinine level, such as uremic clearance granule and tablet of creatinine. These medicines are able to excrete the toxins via the intestinal tract or the double function of adsorption and reparation in a rapid way, which is why many patients can see the lowering of the creatinine level obviously after taking the medicine. However, one the medicines are stopped, the creatinine level gets higher again.

Take dialysis.

The basic principle of dialysis is to purify the blood circulation by eliminating the toxins in it, which is similar to that of the medicines. Nevertheless, dialysis is more direct than medicines with a more effective result in the short term, especially for those who are suffering from the complications of Uremia and Diabetic Nephropathy.

Both medicines and dialysis achieve their purpose for short run without any move to repair the renal function, as a result, the creatinine level grow up quickly after stopping the treatment. Bit by bit, the renal function keep losing and the disease is aggravated.

Micro-Chinese Medicine Osmotherapy.

Different with the other two therapies, Micro-Chinese Medicine Osmotherapy directs at regaining the glomerular filtration rate (GFR) which is a sign of renal function, and finally makes the kidneys expel the creatinine by themselves. This theory is similar to the proverb “give a person with the fish, be inferior to giving a person with fishing”. The Chinese Medicine tries to adjust the systemic immune function and repair the basilar membrane of glomeruli, thus the effective elements in the medicine can get into the body via the acupoints and improve the microcirculation as well as the metabolism in the kidneys. After the medicine playing a part in the body, the abnormal data of the kidney can be turned over and the renal function recovered.

Polycystic Kidney Disease

Autosomal Recessive PKD (ARPKD) mainly occurs in infants, and can lead them die in a very early age, and a few part of them can survive their childhood and little of them can keep alive until their adulthood. Even though ARPKD is a kind of inherited disease, neither of the children’s parents may have symptoms in their whole life. In addition, ARPKD is rare in clinic.

Autosomal Dominant PKD  is always found in adult even though people in any ages may get the disease. It is so common that 5%-10% of the patients with it are at risk to get end stage of Chronic Kidney Disease. Patients with ADPKD are likely to have the symptoms of renal cyst, hematuria, proteinuria and high blood pressure and so on.

Patients get ADPKD from their parents, which means that they are carrying the factors of the disease from the very beginning of their life, but their disease can be found after they grow up. ADPKD can attack a family easily due to its character of heredity. Half of the children may have the disease if one of the parents has PKD, and the percentage will get up to 75% if both of parents have the disease. This is also a key factor which should be noticed, if one of the family members has PKD, other members should be careful and try to delay the occurrence of it.

Recent years, more and more people began to pay attention to the avoiding of the disease which helped a lot to have a better prognosis after accepting a treatment.