I’ve heard different terms for not receiving dialysis. What do they mean? You may have heard of stopping or not starting dialysis. This is also called ‘supportive care’, ‘conservative care’, ‘medical management’ or ‘palliative care’. In advanced CKD (CKD5), it involves managing symptoms with certain medicines, fluid restriction and diet – rather than dialysis. As […]
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10 quick CKD facts – for doctors and nurses These 10 quick facts about CKD, mainly for renal doctors, nurses, AHPs pharmacists and other health professionals. These largely relate to more advanced stages (CKD3B-CKD5). So. What are 10 quick CKD facts – for doctors and nurses? Common causes of chronic kidney disease (CKD) – are
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Everything I need to know about a single kidney Can you live with only one kidney? What happens if you’re born with one kidney? Or if one of them stops working? Read this article to find out what side effects there are to having one kidney, and the changes you might need to make to
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Self-measured blood pressure (BP) monitoring (i.e. taking your blood pressure yourself at home) is recommended for: Long-term BP self-monitoring – of patients with high blood pressure (hypertension) Confirmation of hypertension – when 24-hour ambulatory blood pressure monitoring is unavailable. However, less than 15 percent of commercially available blood pressure devices worldwide have published information on
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Why does this matter? Schistosomiasis, although the commonest cause of haematuria worldwide, often remains undiagnosed and is yet easily treated. What happened in this case? In a recent case report in the NEJM (Kara, 2023), A 13-year-old boy from Mali was referred to a paediatric urology clinic in Turkey, with a 3-month history of macroscopic
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Dialysis is an artificial method of filtering the blood to remove toxins, excess salts and water – in other words, the normal role of the kidneys. There are two types: peritoneal dialysis (PD) and haemodialysis (HD). This article discusses peritoneal dialysis and how it works. What is peritoneal dialysis and how does it work? Peritoneal
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What is dialysis? Dialysis is an artificial method of filtering the blood to remove toxins, excess salts and water – in other words, the normal role of the kidneys. There are two types: haemodialysis (HD) and peritoneal dialysis (PD). This article discusses haemodialysis and how it works. What does haemodialysis mean? ‘Haemo’, of course, means
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Haematuria (blood in the urine) Haematuria means blood in the urine. If it is ‘microscopic’, this means something is so small that it can only be seen through a microscope. So, if you have microscopic haematuria, you have red blood cells in your urine that cannot be seen with the naked eye. In microscopic haematuria
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10 common CKD symptoms Keep track of your kidney data with PKB What are 10 symptoms of chronic kidney disease? Here they are. Urinary symptoms High blood pressure Shortness of breath and ankle swelling (red flag symptoms) – you need to see a doctor soon Tiredness Pain Muscle weakness Not being hungry Itching Poor concentration
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Which antibiotics are best for UTIs? It depends. [“Here we go again!” CKDEx Ed] Why? It depends what we mean by a UTI. Loosely there are two ‘types’: Uncomplicated UTIs – these mainly affect the bladder (cystitis), are mild, and are usually treated with oral antibiotics. An ultrasound is usually not necessary Complicated UTIs –
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