Ogunbor: How to keep your kidney healthy

Ahead of the 2017 World Kidney Day coming up on Thursday, Dr. Chukwuma Ogunbor, a Consultant Family Physician and Chief Operations Officer with Cedar Group Hospital, Festac Town Lagos told PAUL ADUNWOKE how to prevent, treat and manage kidney diseases.

What is kidney failure?
Kidney failure, renal failure or renal insufficiency is a situation, whereby the kidney is not be able to eliminate waste products in the body systems. For instance, urine is a waste product. All the waste products in the body pass through the kidney. The kidney filters out waste products and leave healthy ones.

So, the kidney is said to fail, when it would not perform these functions. When the kidney cannot eliminate waste products in the body system, it becomes toxic to the body systems. Kidney diseases are on the increase these days, as it is estimated that one in every five patients has kidney diseases.

What causes kidney failure?
There are several causes of kidney diseases that may lead to kidney failure.

Some of these include uncontrolled hypertension, chronic inflammation of the kidneys from infections, diabetes, use of skin bleaching and lightening cream or soap, use of herbal concoctions, un-prescribed medications such as, antibiotics and painkillers, HIV infection, polycystic kidney disease, birth defects, urinary obstruction from fibroids and prostrate enlargement, among others.

What are the signs and symptoms of kidney diseases?
Signs and symptoms of kidney diseases include, excessive passage of urine, especially at night. When you pass urine and you notice that it is foamy, you should go for kidney check up. In some cases, people would start to have swelling on their faces, arms and legs, including other parts of the body. Some people would have diarrhoea, vomiting, weight loss, body weakness and sleeping problems, among others.

What should be the next step after these symptoms?
If one has any symptom, the next step is to see the doctor, who would conduct some special medical tests. The patient should go for medical check ups, which include kidney function test and urine test. The patient should go for blood pressure and diabetes check ups.

What are possible ways to prevent kidney diseases?
The prevention of kidney diseases is to stay hydrated at all times. Drink a lot of water, as water helps kidney to filter out waste products in the body system. When one takes a lot of water, the kidney functions optimally, and the person would stay healthy. Again, it is important to eat healthy foods and avoid unhygienic foods because most of them contain unhealthy ingredients, which is not good for the body.

Those who smoke are advised to stop it. We also advise people to reduce their alcoholic intake, just as people using bleaching cream should stop it, because it contains heavy metals that damage the kidney.

Those suffering from obesity, we advise them to cut down their weight. Obese patients should engage in exercises for at least 30 minutes daily. People should use the staircase rather than the lift. All these would go a long way in helping you to stay healthy and fit.

What are possible treatments for kidney failure?
Kidney failure treatments depend on the severity of the case. If it is ordinary kidney failure, the patient would take drugs and it would stop. But if it is chronic kidney disease, the patient should tackle the causes, which might be uncontrolled diabetes or blood pressure.

But in cases, where it would not stop, then the patient should go for dialysis, which is why we are here to serve patients better. Dialysis machine is like additional kidney to the patient, as it does the same work by washing away waste products, such as toxins and keep healthy ones in the body system. Dialysis machine is an option for kidney transplants.

What types of foods would help the kidney stay fit?
People should eat the right foods and avoid oil and fatty foods. Too much salt is not good for the body; you should not eat more than 5.8 grams of salt daily. Avoid eating too much meat, as too much protein in the diet is harmful to the kidneys. Protein digestion produces ammonia toxins that are very destructive to kidneys.

Our kidneys should be hydrated properly to adequately perform their functions. This is done by drinking a lot of water. If we do not drink enough water, the toxins can start accumulating in the blood, as there is not enough fluid to drain them through the kidneys. We recommend people drink more than 10 glasses of water daily.

Taking drugs not prescribed by doctor or intake of herbal concoctions is very dangerous to the health. Herbal concoction contains ingredients and chemicals that are not good for the kidney. It is healthier for one to take more fruits and vegetables.