Spectrum of glomerular diseases in Arab countries: A systematic review

According to the best of our knowledge, there is no review compiling incidence of glomerular disease in all Arab countries. Most of the Arab countries do not have a national renal biopsy registry. In addition, there is scanty data available on the epidemiology of glomerular diseases in Arab countries. In this review, we performed a systematic review analyzing the incidence of glomerular disease in all Arab countries. Relevant manuscripts in all 22 Arab countries found through searches of Medline, Science Direct, Embase, and Google Scholar were evaluated. The time was from January 1990 to March 2018. A total of 36 manuscripts containing 10,727 biopsies from 11 countries were analyzed. The male-to-female ratio was 1.2:1. Saudi Arabia had the largest number of published studies with 14 papers followed equally by Iraq, Jordan, and Sudan with three papers each. The average period of study was 8.17 years. Retrospective studies represented 86.11%. Focal and segmental glomerulosclerosis (FSGS) (27%), minimal change disease (14%), membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (13%), mesangioproliferative glomerulonephritis (13%), and membranous glomerulopathy (11%) were the main types of primary glomerular diseases. The most common types of secondary glomerular diseases were lupus nephritis (LN) (58%), amyloidosis (10.19%), diabetic nephropathy (9.89%), hypertension (4.84%) and poststreptococcal glomerulonephritis (2.72%). In conclusion, FSGS and LN are the most common types of primary and secondary glomerular diseases, respectively, in all evaluated Arab countries. The trend of all types of glomerular diseases has not changed in the last three decades. We strongly recommend that each Arab country should have its own renal biopsy registry.