Symptoms of Renal Parenchymal Disease

There are a variety of renal parenchymal diseases that can cause renal damages and in some cases even renal failure. It can be congenital renal agenesis, polycystic kidney disease or renal tuberculosis, renal tumors; it can be primary glomerulonephritis or secondary renal inflammations; it can involve one or both kidneys. Whatever the underlying cause, renal parenchymal diseases have some common symptoms.

Renal anemia

Renal parenchymal diseases will damage renal tissues and functional units, resulting in declined kidney functions. The impaired kidneys can not secrete enough erythropoietin and cause renal anemia. Patients will appear to be pale, fatigue, weak and lack of energy due to low red blood count.

High blood pressure

Increased blood pressure is typical symptom of renal parenchymal diseases. Weather it is unilateral or bilateral renal parenchymal diseases, it can cause hypertension such as glomerulonephritis, lupus nephritis, PKD, etc. In case of minimal change disease, kidney stone, amyloid nephropathy, hydronephrosis, pyelonephritis, medullary renal cystic disease, the risk of developing high blood pressure is low. Patients with high blood pressure will appear to have headache and dizziness. Poorly controlled high blood pressure can worsen proteinuria, hematuria and other symptoms.

Bubbles in urine

When glomeruli are damaged, large amount of proteins will pass through the glomerular filtration membrane and when the amount is beyond the re-absorption ability of the renal tubules, there will be more than normal proteins being leaked into urine and cause a lot of bubbles in urine. It is called proteinuria in clinic and is one independent factor for worsening renal functions.

High creatinine level

Parenchymal disease can affect unilateral kidney or bilateral kidneys. When more than 50% kidney functions are damaged, creatinine, uric acid and other metabolic wastes can not be discharged efficiently and there will be elevated creatinine level. High creatinine can cause edema, hypoalbuminemia, metabolic acidosis, back pain, urinary changes and it can also worsen high blood pressure and proteinuria.

Besides, other common symptoms that renal parenchymal diseases can cause include swelling, nausea, vomiting, loss of appetite, poor sleep, skin itching, muscle cramps, urinary tract infections, blood in urine, etc.