What Is the Proper Diet for FSGS Patients

FSGS patients need to go on a proper diet due to the damaged kidneys. However, many FSGS patients complain they do not know what they can eat and they can not eat at all. Actually, they need to adjust their diet according to their illness condition, and in different cases, FSGS patients need to make different changes about their diet. Therefore, so far there is no such a food list that suitable for all the FSGS patients. Even though, we can give some guidance to help FSGS patients to arrange a proper diet.

1. Calculating protein intake is a thing that all the FSGS patients need to do

Generally speaking, for FSGS patients with illness condition in early stage (stage 1-3), they can ingest 0.6-0.8grams of protein per pound of body weight a day. And for these with stage 4 FSGS, 0.4grams of protein per pound of body weight a day is necessary. Besides, for people with stage 5 FSGS, if they have not started dialysis, 0.2 grams of protein intake per pound a day is proper and for these with dialysis, they usually need to ingest more protein than healthy peope. In addition, high quality protein can meet the basic physical demand and meanwhile cause less kidney burden, so 60% of protein ingested by FSGS patients should be high quality protein which can be found in lean meat, fish, egg white and milk.

2. Eat less salt

For FSGS patients, eating too much salt not only worsen their swelling symptom, but also elevates their blood pressure. Therefore, please remember to add less salt while cooking. Also, when they go out to eat, try to avoid salted foods like pickles, salted eggs and bacon.

3. Adjust your potassium intake and phosphorus intake

FSGS patients are at higher risk for high potassium and phosphorus levels in blood, but not every of them will suffer these problems. For these who are told to have elevated potassium and phosphorus level, please remember to avoid vegetables and fruits that are rich in potassium and phosphorus.

4. Make sure ingest enough vitamin

Because of serious diet limitation, many FSGS patients can not get enough vitamin from vegetables and fruits. In serious case, they can eat some vitamin supplements to make sure enough vitamin in their body.

These are the several tips on diet for FSGS patients. Because of different illness condition, FSGS patients need to follow different dietary principles, so every patient needs to find a proper diet according to their specific illness condition. Lastly, if there is anything unclear, please feel free to consult us.