Kidney reading

[annieg1890]

Morning everyone, haven't posted for a while as mostly ok.I've had my second AA infusion recently, had a bad tummy after but other than that it was fine.

Had some pain in my hand, which comes and goes, feels like arthritis.

But am more concerned about my Kidneys. Blood tests show my eGFR is low at 80

Anybody know if it's a result of PMR? or completely unrelated?

I'm on pred 2.5 and 3mg alternate days.. diagnosed 2015. 60 next year.

Thanks

A

[PMRpro Ambassador]

An eGFR of 80 is actually pretty good!!! How does that reading relate to others you have had before?

kidneyfund.org/all-about-ki...

"Normal" in young people is above 90, 90-120 is the range. After the age of about 30-40 renal function starts to decline from its peak, slowly at first and then usually a bit faster after the age of 50-60.

Not knowing anything about you, I don't know if you can read and understand this

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

which explains exactly how the numbers are derived and what they mean. But what it explains is that ignoring the natural. physiological decline with age means that older people may think they have kidney disease when the change is purely due to aging and normal.

For your age group, an eGFR of over 60 is considered normal and not due to kidney disease. There need to be other signs - protein in urine for example, before it is a sign of renal disease. And the ranges are up to 60 and over 60 years of age - and obviously it doesn't change dramatically from the week before your birthday to the week after but the numbers take you from low to normal just because of the date!

The eGFR is an estimated figure and can vary from day to day. If you had a good steak for dinner the night before or rushed out for the blood test without having your usual cup of tea or lots of glasses of water on a hot day so you are a bit dehydrated, then the blood creatine level may be a bit higher than usual - and the eGFR looks lower than it is normally.

I doubt any doctor would worry about a 59 year old with an eGFR of 80 - there is a long way to go to levels that indicate problems.

[Koalajane]

as far as I know eGFR at 80 is not low as my readings show normal range to be above 60. My last eGFR was 55 and at 71(in 2 weeks time) I am not too concerned.