Peer-reviewed veterinary case report
Kidney stiffness and urine marker tested in cats with chronic kidney
By Thanaboonnipat, Chutimon et al.·Published in BMC veterinary research·2019·Department of Veterinary Physiology·View original on PubMed →
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Original publication title: Renal shear wave elastography and urinary procollagen type III amino-terminal propeptide (uPIIINP) in feline chronic kidney disease.
- Species:
- cat
Plain-English summary
A group of cats with chronic kidney disease (CKD) were studied to see how well a new non-invasive test called shear-wave elastography (SWE) could measure kidney stiffness and how it related to kidney function. The results showed that CKD cats had stiffer kidneys compared to healthy cats, and this stiffness was linked to higher levels of waste products in their blood. Additionally, a urine test measuring a specific protein (uPIIINP) was found to be higher in CKD cats, suggesting it could help assess kidney damage. This means that SWE and uPIIINP could be useful tools for veterinarians to evaluate kidney health in cats with CKD.
People also search for: cat chronic kidney disease symptoms · cat kidney function tests · non-invasive kidney tests for cats
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is one of the most common diseases occurring in cats. It is characterized by renal fibrosis, which is strongly correlated with impairment of renal function. Since renal biopsy is not performed routinely in clinical practice, the non-invasive method of ultrasonographic shear-wave elastography (SWE) was used to determine renal parenchymal stiffness. Currently, urinary procollagen type III amino-terminal propeptide (uPIIINP) is a renal fibrosis biomarker in humans. Moreover, PIIINP is increasingly applied for identification of fibrosis in various organs in animals. RESULTS: The Young's modulus (E) value on SWE, uPIIINP, and renal function were evaluated in 23 CKD cats and 25 healthy cats (HC). The renal cortical E values were significantly higher than those of the renal medulla in both groups (P < 0.001). The E values of the renal cortex and medulla were significantly higher in CKD cats than in HC (P < 0.001 and P < 0.01, respectively). The E values, especially of the cortex, showed a significant positive correlation with concentrations of plasma creatinine (P < 0.001), blood urea nitrogen (P < 0.05), while they had a negative correlation with urine specific gravity (P < 0.001) and urine osmolality per plasma osmolality ratio (P < 0.01). The uPIIINP to creatinine ratios (uPIIINP/Cr) were significantly higher in CKD cats than in HC (P < 0.01) and were highly correlated with renal cortical E values (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: SWE might be an additively useful and non-invasive diagnostic imaging tool to evaluate renal parenchymal stiffness, which correlates with renal functional impairment in CKD cats. Moreover, the uPIIINP/Cr might be a promissing biomarker for adjunctive assessing the renal fibrosis in feline CKD.
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Search related cases →Original publication on PubMed: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30744640/