[Prevention and screening of chronic renal failure]

Chronic renal failure represents a major problem of public health. Incidence for patients arrived at the terminal stage of the disease is in France 126.4/million inhabitants and the cost of medical care reaches 2 % of the expenses of the National Health Insurance. The progression of the disease is divided into 5 stages that are defined by the level of creatinine clearance from the stage of renal diseases with a normal renal function (clearance>90 ml/min) to the terminal stage (clearance <15 ml/min). Prevalence of patients at this ultimate stage is around 50,000. Prevalence for the totality of patients with a renal disease is evaluated between 2 and 3 millions. Renal diseases must be screened because they are silent and because an early pre-dialysis nephrological care allows renal replacement therapy to be delayed and the number of cardiovascular accidents to be diminished. Screening must be performed in the high-risk populations, essentially patients with diabetes, hypertension, coronary ischemia, renal tract diseases and all subjects treated with drugs toxic for the kidneys. Screening in the total population seems inadequate because of a high cost to benefit ratio. Screening is based on testing for the presence of proteinuria, quantifying the number of formed elements and plasma creatinine determination, the latter allowing, together with age and weight, glomerular filtration rate to be evaluated according to Cockcroft's formula. Prevention of renal diseases in the whole population necessitates the same life style as that recommended for prevention of cardiac and metabolic diseases. In the high-risk populations, one must control glycemia, blood pressure and cholesterol plasma level. In patients that have been already screened, renal function decay has to be slowed down by blocking the renin angiotensin system with converting enzyme inhibitors, controlling plasma cholesterol with statins and diminishing dietary proteins. In the light of these various data, the National Academy of medicine recommends: 1 - in the field of public health, to extend to the whole country the registries containing data on patients with terminal chronic renal failure, to support the creation of medical networks for the screening of renal diseases, to vaccine the patients against hepatitis B, flue and pneumococcal infections and to verify whether a low birth weight is associated with a greater risk of renal diseases in adulthood; 2 - in the field of teaching and research, to stop the decrease in the number of nephrologists, to promote research in genetics, to evaluate the efficacy of antifibrosis drugs and the possible renal toxicity of all new drugs.