Diet plays a very critical role in well being of human body. Since kidneys maintain chemical balance of the body, normal individuals do not have to think twice before gulping down anything into their digestive system. However, individuals with impaired kidneys need to choose their intake carefully in order to generate lesser amount of toxic wastes to be filtered by kidney and reduce pressure on kidney. Diet for healthy people, diet for individuals diagnosed with kidney disease, diet for individuals suffering from ESRD and diet for individuals undergoing kidney transplant are separate and should be properly followed to restore good health.
A well balanced diet is extremely helpful. Why? Because the toxins that accumulate inside us which the kidneys require to filter out are built up from the diet that we intake. But at the same time the meals should be filling and suffice our nutrition/ calorie requirement. A proper diet ensures that the waste products which accumulate inside us create less pressure in our kidneys. It is strongly recommended to consult a dietitian. Doctors do provide a food chart showing what to eat and what not to eat but rarely give the calorie count, carbohydrate intake or exact dietary requirement of renal/ renal diabetic patients.
Remember Diet is not same for pre dialysis and dialysis patients. In general, for a normal healthy person, it is recommended that a well balanced nutritious diet is followed with less sodium, potassium, limited carbohydrates (but not zero), and very limited intake of sugar, fatty oily salted food, no canned food and no bottled juices. It is strongly recommended to intake home cooked fresh food and avoid spicy, oily outside food.
To involve a good dietitian for making a meal plan is very important. Diet of a person suffering from kidney disease is called renal diet. People suffering from diabetes and kidney failure must take renal diabetic diet in consultation with a certified dietitian or nutritionist. Yes, a dietitian. Many people in India still do not give due importance to nutritionist and dietitian to manage their meal plan and think that it is wastage of money and worse, they depend upon friends, family, acquaintances or internet based results for diet and try experimenting on their own body by eating or abstaining from eating various food items.
This may lead to malnutrition or other debilitating effects on a kidney patient. For example, a 20 year old diabetic CKD patient and a 70 year old non diabetic high blood pressure CKD patient may not have same dietary requirement. Therefore, it is advised that a renal dietitian be consulted for a suitable diet plan for CKD patients.
Dietitian
A dietitian is a graduate in dietetics and her role is to assess nutritional requirements of a patient and provide proper diet plan to an individual based on the disease they are suffering from, their height, weight, gender, race, food habits, etc for a balanced diet. Dietitians give diet chart to people based on their requirement.
Renal Dietitian counsels a kidney patient and devises for her/ him a suitable kidney friendly diet based on the patient’s stage of kidney disease, whether they are under dialysis, the patient’s age, height, weight, whether they are suffering from diabetes, their fluid intake restrictions if any, their food habits (veg/ non veg), etc. The role of the Renal Dietitian is diverse, with involvement in the nutritional care of patients with renal disease in the early stages, pre-dialysis, dialysis and post transplantation. For example, pre-dialysis patients should have low protein intake, dialysis patient should have high protein intake, post transplantation patients high protein intake to prevent loss of body mass and so on. Also, diabetic and non diabetic kidney patients will have separate dietary requirements.
It may be noted that all individuals are unique beings having unique body type, food habit, food liking, food allergies, veg/ non veg preference, climatic and local food availability and many more diverse issues. More so, a patient suffering from chronic kidney disease develops fluid wastes inside the body which they cannot flush out normally due to reduced kidney functioning. These wastes are toxic build up of the food and liquid we ingest after the nutrition from such food is absorbed inside the body. If right diet is taken, then waste formation cannot be stopped but the toxicity from that waste can be reduced to some extent. This is why it is important to consult a dietitian.