Kidney Thinking. The blog from Think Kidneys

As I was acutely reminded at the recent 2nd Leeds Critical Care Nephrology Course by Dr Neil Soni, (Intensivist from Chelsea and Westminster Hospital), Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) must not suffer the same fate as sepsis, whereby we lump all types of AKI together and forget to identify the underlying cause. AKI is a syndrome which is most commonly caused by sepsis and hypotension but has…

It has recently been recognised that 5-7% of all admissions to hospital in the UK develop acute kidney injury (AKI) and that overall this is associated with an astonishing 20% risk of dying during that hospital admission. How much of this AKI, and the harm associated with it, is avoidable is as yet unknown, but evidence from the NCEPOD enquiry into deaths from AKI suggested that…

As Chief Nurse and Director of Quality at Southern Derbyshire CCG I am responsible for quality and innovation.  Acute Kidney Injury (AKI) has been on our radar for a while as a condition that is a really big challenge. It’s a challenge that is faced in secondary care, primary care as well as specialist and community settings, so we knew that if we could find some solutions we’d…

Do we know what to tell our patients about medicines management and ‘Sick Day’ Rules / Holidays? Are we spreading this message? As a pharmacist I know I am in my workplace and at home! Recently when my 20year old cat, who takes ACEis to protect his kidneys, developed diarrhoea and vomiting, I found my husband temporarily withholding his medications, a ‘Sick Day’ holiday, to reduce…

A personal story of how a 7 year old boy’s holiday food poisoning led to acute kidney injury. Read his story here