Nephropathy: When Diabetes Hits Kidney

Diabetes can cause diabetic nephropathy, meaning kidney deterioration. It is best to manage diabetes well to avoid deadly complications. When diabetes hits kidney, health problems do accumulate.

Kidney disease among patients with diabetes is usually called diabetic nephropathy. When diabetes hits kidney, there should be some adjustments, treatments and medications to be made fast to avoid further kidney-related health problems. About 40 percent of diabetics shall develop nephropathy – a term generally used to describe the deterioration of kidney functions.

The kidneys have millions of small clusters of blood vessels that filter the waste from the blood. Diabetes can damage this fragile filtering system, which can lead to kidney illness or failure that may require dialysis and transplant.

The high level of sugar in the blood which characterizes diabetes can cause a major damage to the kidneys. The National Kidney and Urologic Diseases Information Clearinghouse (NKUDIC) gave some information on the kidneys’ function to help us appreciate its vital function and that long complication of diabetic nephropathy is avoided earlier. If diabetes is already present, never let the time come when diabetes hits kidney.

NKUDIC states that there is a need for sugar to be broken to smaller molecules so it can exit the bloodstream. If it cannot exit the blood properly, its large particles can be a poison upon entering the kidneys – damaging the kidney’s tiny filtering tubules.

Even small interruptions in the brain due to inadequate insulin release to some receptors, can already lead to disorders in the kidney. Indeed, proper functioning of the insulin in the brain is needed by the kidneys to output urine properly.

Now, let us see how diabetes gradually damage the kidneys that can lead to diabetic nephropathy. Diabetes can easily injure the tiny blood vessels of the body. When diabetes hits kidney, it damages the blood vessels of the kidneys, and the latter cannot properly clean the blood. The body shall retain more salt and water resulting to ankle swelling and more body weight. Waste materials accumulate in the blood. Urine remains in the bladder which can cause infection from the fast growth of urine bacteria that has a lot of sugar.

In the long run, the kidneys’ inability to rid off the “poisons” from the blood can cause the increase of creatinine and urea. This is known as “chronic renal failure”, “end-stage renal disease” or “end stage kidney disease” and already requires dialysis or transplant.