Renal biopsy is to collect some nephrones of patients with kidney disease in order to make clear the pathological changes of kidney.
A thorough diagnosis process can be classified into three parts. Firstly, based on patients’ clinical symptoms, doctors can diagnose kidney diseases like Chronic Kidney Disease, Acute Kidney Disease, Nephritic Syndrome and Lupus Nephritis. And these are clinical diagnosis. Secondly, doctors need to know in which specific renal part pathological changes take place, and this is called pathological diagnosis. By this, kidney diseases can be classified into Mesangial Proliferative Glomerulonephritis(MSPGM), Crescentic Glomerulonephritis(CreGN), IgA Nephritis, Mesangial Proliferative Nephritis, FSGS(Focal Segmental Glomerulosclerosis) of the kidneys. The third is the diagnosis of renal function. and corresponding terms include renal failure of Azotemia period, Uremia and so on.
Clinical and renal function diagnosis can be performed through symptoms and urine or blood tests, however, the diagnosis of pathological changes must be done through taking biopsy.
Then, why diagnosis on pathological changes is of so great importance?
Clinical diagnosis has its limitation, and varied renal pathological changes may have the same clinical symptom. For example, Nephritic Syndrome is the clinical presence of Chronic Kidney Disease, however, the pathological mechanism of which could differ greatly, including Mesangial proliferative nephritis, IgA Nephritis and so on. As to diseases of different pathological mechanism, the therapeutic principles could be totally different. Inappropriate treatment can only let slip the optimum treatment timing. While, biopsy can help with certifying disease pathological mechanism, so doctors will be able to adopt treatments most suitable to cure the disease. In fact, some kidney diseases are secondary disease, and biopsy result can help with tracing up the primary disease and then doctors can adopt proper treatments.
Clinical symptoms can not thoroughly or actually reflect the damage degree of the kidneys. for example, one patient may suffer from little quantity of protein urine, but the biopsy test may show that serious damages have occurred in the kidneys, and the adoption of new treatments will be necessary. On the other hand, patients with serious protein leakage may suffer from just slight renal damages.
Pathological results are very useful for disease prognosis. Based on pathological results, doctors can make clear whether the disease is chronic or acute, damages are reversible or irreversible. Especially when kidney disease has progressed into Uremia, biopsy result plays a great role in determining whether Kidney Transplantation is workable or not. Repeated biopsy is also helpful with observing the disease progression and analyzing curative effects, which are the basis for any therapeutic treatment adjustment.
Referring to collecting some nephrones, we surely will mention the damages to kidneys. Frankly speaking, for patients with kidney diseases, they need to avoid any possible further damage to kidneys. However, biopsy is so important for the making clear of illness condition and adopting proper treatments that this mini damage to kidney is worthy. In addition, biopsy test only need 15-30 nephrones and we have approximately one million nephrones. The kidneys have powerful self-recovering ability, and the mini needle hole made for Nephrone collection can be repaired soon.
