Chronic Renal Failure

Chronic Renal Failure will usually happen in stages and not all at once. The frequent causes of CRF are from:

1. Uncontrolled diabetes type 1 and type 2

2. Uncontrolled Hypertension

3. Chronic Urinary Tract Infections

4. Polycystic Kidney Disease

5. Glomerulonephritis is a chronic kidney destructive problem that gradually tears away at the glomeruli in the kidney.

When you are having chronic renal faliure, your kidneys are slowly dying until your kidneys reach end-stage-renal failure. In the earliest stages of chronic renal failure, there will hardly be any symptoms that are noticed. As it continues to progress however, symptoms will slowly appear. The symptoms that are the most common as chronic renal failure progresses are:

1. Hiccups

2. Tiredness

3. Malaise (Unwell feeling)

4. Sick to your stomach and throwing up meals a lot

5. Weight loss that is unexplainable

6. Bad headache pain

7. Intensive itching that will drive you crazy

8. Hypertension

9. There is a high amount of protein in the urine

As chronic renal failure goes on, there will be some very debilitating symptoms that will continue. These prominent symptoms are those like:

1. You are vomiting up blood

2. Not producing very much if any urine, and what little produced is blood, (hematuria)

3. Not feeling anything, (the sensory nerves being affected)

4. Leg cramps

5. Urea on the skin and breath which is in the form of a chalky type of white substance

When urea is appearing on the skin, it means uremia, which is a fancy medical term for kidney failure.

Blood tests in chronic renal failure in the first stages will not be that bad. But as this process goes on, the blood tests will show some very poor results.

Creatnine blood levels will rise, and the glomerular filtration rate (gfr) will steadily drop. This is telling you that your kidneys want to perform less and less.

BUN, which is Blood Urea Nitrogen tells whether or not the urea is being processed well by the kidneys or not. A level that is starting to rise above 39 or more means trouble.

A blood test for potassium is going to be high, reflecting that the kidneys are not processing your potassium and letting it become toxic to you in your blood.

Sodium levels may also be out of sight in the bloodstream. This is another key factor that kidneys are not letting go of sodium properly, and therefore, this too builds up in the blood.

Calcium levels will be high too since kidneys will not process calcium either due to the fact that nephrons are being destroyed.

The whole goal of treating chronic renal failure is to slow down the process so that you can stay clear of actual kidney failure altogether for as long as possible.

Diuretics will be part of your care regime as well as potassium binders which hold back the potassium levels from going too high. The diuretic medications will get rid of excess water as long as you are still making urine. Calcium binders will be added as well since calcium is another substance that is going to build up extremely high from the kidneys failing to process it in the blood.

A special diet is a must for those with advanced stages of chronic renal failure. Part of the diet is fluid restrictions since urine production gradually declines. Your intake of sodium, potassium, and calcium will be limited to certain amounts daily. A specialized dietitian will need to sit down with you to work out your daily dietary plans according to your kidney doctor's recommendations.

Above all, chronic renal failure must be monitored carefully by your doctor in order for you to receive proper treatments. Dialysis will definitely occur in the later stages of chronic renal failure since that is the only way to survive when kidney function (gfr) is under 15% or less.