Tag: #kidneyresearchuk

Breathing Difficulty in Kidney Disease

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Breathing Difficulty in Chronic Kidney Disease is an inevitable accompaniment in advanced stages. But why does CKD make you breathless in the first place? Learn here.

The other day, some of us at Team ATK just sat reflecting on our pre-transplant days with Kidney Failure. And we all concurred on the helplessness we felt about that relentless “out-of-breath” sensation even at the slightest exertion. In fact, right after transplant, this was one of the first positive changes that I remember as uplifting my quality of life. I could breathe fully, freely & effortlessly again!

So, what is this “breathlessness” or as the fancy medical terminology would have it, “Dyspnoea” (pronounced as “disp-neah”) in Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) all about? Continue reading “Breathing Difficulty in Kidney Disease” →

Muscle Wasting in CKD: Treatment

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Muscle wasting & pain is a common complication reported in most patients with Chronic Kidney Disease, worldwide. Speaking from personal experience, this is also one of those “visibly apparent” physical changes in the course of CKD, which can have a negative impact on our already complicated quality of life.

So, can you prevent this from happening? Well, that’s the million-dollar (research) question, isn’t it?

In our previous article in this category, we covered the whole bunch of causes that conspire together in CKD to make your muscles gradually “lose themselves” over time. Fortunately, medical research has offered us effective solutions to keep muscle wasting in CKD at bay for as long as possible. In addition, some approaches can also partially restore muscle bulk and strength after muscle wasting has already started.

Muscle Wasting Treatment Cover

 

Let’s explore these treatments then, shall we?

Continue reading “Muscle Wasting in CKD: Treatment” →

Muscle Pain & Wasting in CKD

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Muscle Pain 

Muscle Pain cover

 

Muscle Pain & wasting (shrivelling) is a constant, debilitating & rather frustrating accompaniment during your CKD journey, in the advanced stages. It is only but one of the many myriad “complaints” arising from across multiple organs — something that’s a part & parcel of Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD).

Previously, Team ATK has simplified the concepts of “Protein in Urine“, “Blood in Urine“, “Anemia” & “Bone Pain“, in the context of CKD.

Adding to this list, today we seek to cover the significance of skeletal muscles in kidney disease and explain why muscles begin to “lose themselves” when we enter the great abyss of Chronic Kidney Disease!

But first things first. Continue reading “Muscle Pain & Wasting in CKD” →

Bone Pain in CKD: Treatment

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Bone pain is an inevitable consequence of advanced Chronic Kidney Disease. Our previous article explained why this is the case. We elucidated on the “crosstalk” that exists between kidneys and bones in normal health, and how their “relationship turns painful” when Chronic Kidney Disease hits!

This article serves to cover the treatment principles that help make that debilitating pain go away, literally by acting as “relationship counsellors” for the Kidney & Bones.

Let’s get started then, shall we? Continue reading “Bone Pain in CKD: Treatment” →

Bone Pain in Chronic Kidney Disease

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Bone Pain in Chronic Kidney Disease

Most members of Club CKD are well-acquainted with that debilitating knee or lower back pain which intensifies as kidney failure approaches.

Your medical team gets your bloodwork done & may be able to relate this pain to desperately low levels of Vitamin D!
(provided you don’t already have a separate bone or nerve condition)

But we’re talking about Chronic Kidney Disease, right? What does Vitamin D have anything to do with it? And how does that cause you bone pain? Let us try & dissect this topic, shall we? Continue reading “Bone Pain in Chronic Kidney Disease” →

Urine Colour: Variations in Kidney & Urinary Tract Disease

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Urine Colour

“Urine Colour. Just how significant is it?!”

Human Urine – the biochemical masterpiece “manufactured” by our Kidneys as a by-product of all the work that they do  –  is normally a clear, pale / straw yellow to dark (but transparent) yellow in colour. This is attributed to the pigment Urochrome normally found in urine.

In good health, how yellow your urine appears directly relates to your water/liquid intake. The more dehydrated you are, the denser & more concentrated your urine is, and the darker is the yellow colour as depicted in the image below.

Normal Urine Colour
Normal variation in Urine Colour in good health. Healthy urine samples are transparent and vary from a pale or straw yellow to a dark yellow shade.

 

Samples in the image above aptly show the normal variation in Urine Colour in good health. For all practical diagnostic purposes, this urine colour range qualifies as normal. Now, Urine is not a topic that would usually make the cut in any polite conversation in non-specialist social gatherings.

But did you know?

Something as humble and underappreciated as your Urine Colour is a reliable clinical criterion used by physicians to substantiate their clinical opinion on your health status. Continue reading “Urine Colour: Variations in Kidney & Urinary Tract Disease” →

It’s not just your Lungs!…Smoking damages your Kidneys too!

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Be it the rugged Marlboro Man or the suave James Bond, showbiz has had a way of making a big section of its audience (especially the impressionable age groups) believe how smoking Cigarettes (tobacco) has an important role in building a “more attractive” social image for themselves. However, what these unsuspecting viewers are unaware of is the full range of clinically proven and often fatal health complications that accompany smoking tobacco in the long run.

Continue reading “It’s not just your Lungs!…Smoking damages your Kidneys too!” →

11 Myths around Kidney Disease Debunked!

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Kidneys are essential for your survival. And Kidney Disease is a major cause of sickness & death worldwide.  But if diagnosed early on, and necessary treatment procedures are initiated on time, some of these conditions could be reversed to normalcy, while for others, the progression of the condition to frank kidney failure can be effectively delayed. However, early diagnosis & treatment are not always implemented in reality. And some existing Myths around Kidney Disease have a significant role in hampering this process.

It is imperative, that you pro-actively educate yourself on this front to combat any ignorance, apprehension or confusion on this topic and choose a better quality of life for yourself, today and tomorrow!

So, here’s busting the commonest Myths around Kidney Disease with established facts. Read on to empower yourself!

 

Continue reading “11 Myths around Kidney Disease Debunked!” →

Love Thy Kidneys!

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I have been thinking about this for a while now. How would it be, if we decided to assign a gender to our organs based on their “inherent nature”. Without hesitation, I’ll call our kidneys, female.

Somewhat like our Mums actually! (Yeah, you read that right).

This cute, smooth, bean-shaped major organ-pair is:

  •  “Effortlessly multitasking”
  •  “Hygiene-conscious”
  •  “Meticulous”
  •  “Complex yet super-organized”
  •  “Layered & difficult to understand at times”
  •  “Fantastically resilient to all external stress” (up until it gets unbearable of course)

and above all

  •  “Holds the entire organ-family from “falling apart”

 

All quintessential mommy traits eh?

Welcome Smiley kidneys in ATK

Time to bring kidneys to the limelight for all she’s worth then?

So, watch this space for more to obtain a medically accurate understanding of this beautiful but highly underrated organ.

In this portal, you will find: –

So what are you waiting for?

Explore https://www.allthingskidney.com today.

Unleash the power of knowing. Beat the apprehension/confusion/ignorance surrounding kidneys in health & disease.

Stay well, all of you!

 

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