Spectrum of IgA nephropathy in a single center

Immunoglobulin A (IgA) nephropathy (IgAN) is the most common biopsy-proven primary glomerular disease in the world and a major contributor to the worldwide burden of endstage renal failure, with a wide geographical variation. To determine the incidence, clinical profile and histological pattern of IgAN in our institute, we reviewed all the patients who had native kidney biopsies with the diagnosis of primary IgAN during the period from 1998 to 2009 in the context of the clinical features. A total of 116 patients with IgAN were finally analyzed; 85 (73%) of the patients were male, the mean age of the patients was 29.2 ± 12.2 (range 10-70) years and the mean duration of disease was 10.4 ± 18.7 months (median: 2 months). Hypertension was present in 74 (63.2%) cases. Gross hematuria was rare. The most common clinical presentation was nephrotic syndrome, followed by chronic renal failure. The mean proteinuria level was 2.5 ± 2.3 g/day (median: 1.7 g/day) and the mean serum creatinine level was 3.04 ± 3.3 mg/dL (median:1.7 mg/dL). The morphological sub-classification (Haas): Class I was the most common (44.4%), followed by class V (23%). IgA co-deposition with C3 and lambda was the most common finding in the immunofluorescence study. The glomerular filtration rate decreased with advanced histological damage. The incidence of IgAN was 7.5%, which is lower as compared with studies from elsewhere. IgAN in our population had a more severe clinical presentation.