Study Finds Malnutrition Linked to Decline in Kidney Function in Older Individuals

A new study has found that malnutrition is associated with chronic kidney disease, increased risk of kidney function decline and poor kidney function in older adults who don’t suffer from advanced kidney disease.

Chronic kidney disease, which is sometimes referred to as chronic kidney failure, occurs when an individual’s kidneys gradually lose function and fail to filter blood as they should. Treatment for this disease is focused on slowing the progression of damage to the kidneys, which isn’t easy to do if the disease has already advanced to end-stage kidney failure.

The study was conducted by researchers at the Cheeloo College of Medicine, Shandong University of China. Its findings were published in the “Journal of Renal Nutrition.”

For their study, the researchers assessed the correlation of malnutrition risk status with chronic kidney disease progression, the risks of kidney decline and kidney function in more than 5,000 community-dwelling older individuals in the population-based longitudinal aging studies in Singapore.

The investigators measured eGFR at baseline as well as the risk of malnutrition at baseline, using the Nutrition Screening Initiative Determine Your Nutritional Health Checklist. During a follow-up of three to five years, they measured eGFR again in a subcohort of individuals who hadn’t been diagnosed with chronic kidney disease. eGFR (estimated glomerular filtration rate) is used by healthcare providers to determine if an individual has kidney disease and, if yes, what stage the disease has progressed to.

Cross-sectional analyses at baseline showed that among older individuals, low, medium and high levels of malnutrition correlated with risking chronic kidney disease odds ratios and reducing eGFR coefficients. The researchers also found that longitudinal analyses demonstrated that all levels of malnutrition were linked to a heightened risk of abnormal eGFR. It should be noted that no patient included in the study used dialysis or had been diagnosed with end-stage kidney disease.

The researchers, led by Yanxia Lu, stated that while the link between malnutrition and chronic kidney disease was well known, no studies had looked into whether malnutrition risk increased the likelihood of older individuals developing early-stage chronic kidney disease or predisposed them to decline in kidney function.

They explained that understanding the link between kidney function and malnutrition risk status, and the risk of decline in kidney function and disease was necessary in order to recommend a preventative strategy on nutrition for older individuals, which could prevent end-stage renal failure and, if possible, slow the decline in kidney function.

The researchers noted that physicians needed to consider using preventative interventions to decrease the risk of malnutrition in patients in this population. Other researchers at companies such as AREV Life Sciences Global Corp. (CSE: AREV) (OTC: AREVF) are also looking to come up with breakthrough treatments indicated for the complications, which can be traced to malnutrition.

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