According to the National Kidney Foundation, each year nearly 1 in 9 adults in the United States are diagnosed with chronic kidney disease (CKD) and 20 million more are at increased risk.
The kidneys may become diseased or damaged in a number of ways, including:
- Diabetes (the most common cause of end-stage renal disease)
- High blood pressure (hypertension) - the second most common cause of end-stage renal disease.
- Decreased blood flow
- Obstruction or narrowing of the renal artery (renal artery stenosis)
- Toxic injury to the kidney or direct injury to the kidney
Symptom of kidney disease include:
- loss of appetite
- nausea and vomiting
- extreme fatigue
- difficulty sleeping
- itching and dry skin
- muscle cramps
- shortness of breath
- fluid retention
- twitching
Treatment at Barnes-Jewish Hospital
- Barnes-Jewish Hospital is one of the largest and oldest providers of dialysis services in the United States, having first offered hemodialysis in 1968.
- Surgeons at Barnes-Jewish Hospital performed their first kidney transplant in 1963; today transplant surgeons perform almost 200 transplants each year.
- Rates of kidney transplant rejection at Barnes-Jewish Hospital are among the lowest in the United States.
- Barnes-Jewish Hospital is 1 of 7 National Institutes of Health-designated George M. O'Brien Kidney Centers and one of the largest sites for National Institutes of Health-sponsored training of kidney physicians in the United States.
Surgical Services The Barnes-Jewish hospital staff has a strong commitment to providing hemodialysis access, peritoneal dialysis access and general surgery for patients with kidney failure. The care provided ensures attention to the particular problems of the kidney failure patient regardless of the type of surgical problem encountered. The problems of hemodialysis access are addressed by a multidisciplinary group, including surgery, nephrology and interventional radiology with the goal of providing reliable vascular access even in the most difficult cases. Kidney biopsies are performed for diagnostic purposes and interpreted by experts in renal pathology.