According to MSc.BS. CKI Tran Quoc Phong, Head of Urology Unit, An Binh Hospital (HCMC), chronic kidney disease is considered a "silent killer" because in the early stages there are usually no specific symptoms. Many people still eat and live normally even though albuminuria has appeared or glomerular filtration levels have begun to decline.
When the disease progresses, patients may experience symptoms such as swelling in limbs, uncontrollable high blood pressure, prolonged fatigue, itchy skin, loss of appetite, nausea, cramps, frequent nighttime urination, decreased urine output or shortness of breath. However, these signs not only appear in kidney disease but also in many other diseases, making patients easily subjective or confused with age, stress or lack of sleep.
Explaining the reason why kidney disease is often detected late, Dr. Tran Quoc Phong said that the kidney has a very large ability to compensate. When a part of the kidney's filter unit (nephron) is damaged, the remaining nephrons can still increase activity to maintain blood filtration function. Therefore, the body usually does not show obvious symptoms until the damage has progressed significantly.
Many people think that still urinating normally means a healthy kidney. In fact, the kidney's ability to produce urine and the ability to filter out toxins are not completely the same," Dr. Phong emphasized.
According to experts, edema, fatigue, or anemia may be related to kidney disease but are not specific signs. Edema can occur due to the body holding water salts or losing protein through urine. Meanwhile, fatigue may stem from the accumulation of toxins, electrolyte disorders, or anemia. When kidney function declines, the amount of erythropoietin hormone produced by the kidneys also decreases, reducing the ability to produce red blood cells and leading to anemia in progressive stages.
Dr. Tran Quoc Phong recommends that people with diabetes, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, obesity, metabolic disorders; with a family history of kidney disease; people with gout, recurrent urinary stones, prolonged urinary tract infections or regularly using pain relievers, drugs of unknown origin should proactively check their kidney function periodically.
To detect kidney disease early, in addition to blood creatinine testing, people should be assessed simultaneously with two important indicators: estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) and albumin/creatinineuria ratio (UACR). According to Dr. Phong, the creatinine index within the normal limit is not enough to completely eliminate the risk of early-stage kidney disease.
