Children With Kidney Disease Face Many Health Woes

WEDNESDAY, Aug. 17 (HealthDay News) — Poor growth, heart problems and delays in puberty are among the problems experienced by children with mild to moderately impaired kidney function, new research says.

The study of 586 children with chronic kidney disease also found that even when some of them took medications to treat these health problems, including high blood pressure and metabolic issues, the conditions became more common as kidney function decreased.

The study appears online in the August issue of the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.

“We were hoping to identify risk factors for CKD progression and see if these can be targeted to slow the decline of kidney function and prevent its complications,” study author Dr. Susan Furth, of the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, said in a journal news release.

“Our findings suggest that more aggressive interventions to improve blood pressure and metabolic abnormalities may be areas where interventions could slow chronic kidney disease progression and decrease the prevalence of cardiovascular disease in children and young adults with chronic kidney disease,” Furth said.

The next step for Furth and colleagues is to use the findings from this study to design clinical trials with more aggressive interventions.

More information

The U.S. National Kidney Foundation has more about chronic kidney disease in children.

– Robert Preidt

SOURCE: Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, news release, Aug. 12, 2011

Last Updated: Aug. 17, 2011