Skip to main content
  • Book
  • © 2016

Understanding Kidney Diseases

  • Provides a systematic approach to kidney disease management
  • Presents a collection of illustrative case studies together with graphical representations of patients kidney function against time to aid trainees in the understanding of kidney diseases, clinical assessment of patients and formulation of management plans
  • Covers all major clinical issues affecting kidney function in adults that a non-specialist doctor is likely to encounter

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check for access.

Table of contents (19 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xxi
  2. Kidney Anatomy and Physiology

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 1-10
  3. Measuring Kidney Function

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 11-29
  4. Plot All the Dots

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 31-49
  5. How Are You Feeling?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 51-57
  6. Do You Have Any Long-Term Health Conditions?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 59-75
  7. Are You Pregnant or Planning a Pregnancy?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 77-81
  8. What Is Your Family History?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 83-101
  9. What Have You Been Taking?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 103-115
  10. Height and Weight

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 117-124
  11. Blood Pressure

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 125-132
  12. Test the Urine

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 133-159
  13. Examine the Patient

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 161-171
  14. Full Blood Count, Urea and Electrolytes, Bicarbonate, Bone Profile

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 173-195
  15. Immunology

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 197-214
  16. Image the Urinary Tract

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 215-230
  17. Should We Do a Kidney Biopsy?

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 231-236
  18. Make a Plan

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 237-253
  19. Renal Replacement Therapy

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 255-274
  20. Epilogue

    • Hugh Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford
    Pages 275-277

About this book

This text aids medical students and trainee doctors in developing their knowledge of the conditions covered and improving their ability to clinically assess patients and formulate a management plan. Once doctors are comfortable in interpreting these graphs, they can use them in consultations with patients about their kidney condition and so support self-management by patients, an increasingly important aspect of healthcare. Kidney diseases and the speciality of nephrology have traditionally been regarded as difficult to understand. This is compounded by the use of complex definitions and terminology.  These complex definitions result from a need to categorise kidney diseases according to the way kidney function changes over time, and then to express this in numbers and words.  Central to the assessment of patients is the measurement of kidney function. In our teaching of medical students and trainee doctors, as well as in our clinical practice and interaction with GPs and consultantcolleagues, we have found that viewing graphs of patients’ kidney function (estimated glomerular filtration rate, or eGFR) against time is a much easier way of understanding kidney diseases. It provides the patient’s ‘kidney history’ and leads into a description of the natural history and management of their condition.   We were surprised to find that this graphical approach is not used routinely in teaching or in daily clinical practice. We therefore believe there is a need for a book that uses this approach and we thus sought to compile a collection of illustrative case studies covering an array of disease categories, together with patients’ eGFR readings.

Reviews

“This book goes a long way to remediating these deficiencies and is a must have for any medical student or junior Doctor struggling with the subject as well as for Doctors in training considering a career in renal medicine. … In this book the authors don’t just manage to impart knowledge and information, but a careers’ worth of experience. This book can be used well as a reference tool … .” (Matthew Graham-Brown, Renal Medicine, renalmed.co.uk, January, 2016)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Department of Renal Medicine, Birmingham Heartlands Hospital, Birmingham, United Kingdom

    Hugh C. Rayner, Mark Thomas

  • Birmingham Children's Hospital, Birmingham, United Kingdom

    David Milford

About the authors

Dr Hugh Rayner gained a first class degree in physiology at Cambridge University before qualifying with honours at the London Hospital Medical College in 1981. He was awarded an MD from the University of Leicester for studies on experimental models of kidney disease. After a number of training posts, including a year as clinical fellow in Melbourne Australia, he was appointed as a consultant in renal and general medicine in Birmingham in 1993.

As part of his studies for the Diploma in Medical Education from Dundee University in 1996, he presented a dissertation on the interpretation of serum creatinine and published a consensus curriculum for undergraduate renal medicine [1]. He is a full time nephrologist, clinical lead for the West Midlands Renal Network, and continues to teach renal medicine to undergraduates and trainee doctors.

 

Dr Mark Thomas studied Biological Sciences and Medicine as an undergraduate at Kings College London and Westminster Medical School. After postgraduate training he was a Research Fellow at Washington University Medical School in St Louis, USA for three years, studying models of proteinuric renal disease. This interest continued during Senior Registrar training in Leicester. He has been a Consultant Nephrologist and Physician at the Heart of England Foundation Trust in Birmingham since 1998.

 

He has had a clinical research interest in acute kidney injury (AKI) for some years, including earlier detection and intervention in AKI. He is chief investigator for the Acute Kidney Outreach to Reduce Deterioration and Death (AKORDD) study, a large pilot study of AKI outreach. He has chaired clinical guideline development groups for AKI and anaemia management in CKD for the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE).

  

Dr David Milford

commenced basic paediatric training in 1983 and higher paediatric training at Sheffield Children’s Hospital in 1986.  He undertook research in the Department of Nephrology, Birmingham Children’s Hospital into the epidemiology of diarrhea-associated haemolytic uraemic syndrome resulting in several major publications and a thesis for Doctor of Medicine. He was appointed consultant nephrologist at Birmingham Children’s Hospital in 1992.   His interests include hypertension, acute kidney injury and renal transplantation.   

Bibliographic Information

  • Book Title: Understanding Kidney Diseases

  • Authors: Hugh C. Rayner, Mark Thomas, David Milford

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-23458-8

  • Publisher: Springer Cham

  • eBook Packages: Medicine, Medicine (R0)

  • Copyright Information: Springer International Publishing Switzerland 2016

  • eBook ISBN: 978-3-319-23458-8Published: 30 November 2015

  • Edition Number: 1

  • Number of Pages: XXI, 300

  • Number of Illustrations: 135 b/w illustrations, 81 illustrations in colour

  • Topics: Nephrology, Diabetes

Buy it now

Buying options

eBook USD 99.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Other ways to access