before) • Heart and blood vessel disease • Anemia • Mineral and bone disorder • Kidney failure and the need for kidney transplant or dialysis • Other health problems 20 COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. 21 Take charge of your health. Visit your doctor regularly. COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. What Can You Do Now to Protect Your Kidneys? • If you have high blood pressure, keep it under control. Ask your doctor what your blood pressure goal is and how you can reach that goal. • If you have diabetes, keep it under control. Know your goal for hemoglobin A1c level and get to that goal. • Take your prescribed medicines as your doctor advises. • Live a healthy lifestyle o Eat less salt and fat. o Exercise. o Lose weight if you are overweight. o Don’t smoke. 22 COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. • See your doctor regularly. • Ask for the 2 simple tests if you are at risk for chronic kidney disease. (See pages 16 and 17.) • Be careful about taking over-the-counter pain medicines too often. Ask your pharmacist which over-the-counter medicines are harmful to the kidneys. • Avoid drinking too much alcohol. 23 COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. Know Your Numbers! 24 Blood pressure Blood sugar (glucose) GFR Protein in urine Cholesterol Other TEST Date/ Numbers Date/ Numbers Date/ Numbers COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. REMEMBER! • Kidney disease has no symptoms. • Know your risks for getting chronic kidney disease. (See page 7.) • If you are at risk for kidney disease, get 2 simple tests! (See pages 16 and 17.) • If you have diabetes or high blood pressure, know your goals for treatment. Work with your doctor to meet your goals. • Chronic kidney disease can be treated. • Live a healthy lifestyle. • Learn and do all you can to keep healthy. 25 COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. To learn more about kidney disease: Talk with your doctor. All questions about your health are worth asking. Sometimes questions come up only after leaving the doctor’s office. Write them down for when you talk with the doctor again. Take the Kidney Quiz on page 30. Or go to our website and take the Kidney Quiz: www. kidney.org/kidneydisease/kidneyquiz.cfm Learn more at: www.kidney.org 26 COPYRIGHT: NATIONAL KIDNEY FOUNDATION. DO NOT REPRODUCE. 27 Contact the NKF Cares patient help line at 855.NKF.CARES (855.653.2273) nkfcares@kidney.org for a free copy of these brochures and others: Other helpful sources: The National Kidney and Urologic Diseases Information Clearinghouse 3 Information Way Bethesda, MD 20892-3580 800.891.5390 www.kidney.niddk.nih.gov The American Diabetes Association ATTN: National Call Center 1701 North Beauregard Street Alexandria, VA 22311 800.DIABETES (800.342.2383) www.diabetes.org e-ma The worldwide burden of kidney disease is rising, but public awareness remains limited, underscoring the need for more effective communication by stakeholders in the kidney health community. Despite this need for clarity, the nomenclature for describing kidney function and disease lacks uniformity. In June 2019, Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) convened a Consensus Conference with the goal of standardizing and refining the nomenclature used in the English language to describe kidney function and disease, and of developing a glossary that could be used in scientific publications. Guiding principles of the conference were that the revised nomenclature should be patient-centered, precise, and consistent with nomenclature used in the KDIGO guidelines. Conference attendees reached general consensus on the following recommendations: (i) to use “kidney“ rather than “renal” or “nephro-” when referring to kidney disease and kidney function; (ii) to use “kidney failure” with appropriate descriptions of presence or absence of symptoms, signs, and treatment, rather than “end-stage kidney disease”; (iii) to use the KDIGO definition and classification of acute kidney diseases and disorders (AKD) and acute kidney injury (AKI), rather than alternative descriptions, to define and classify severity of AKD and AKI; (iv) to use the KDIGO definition and classification of chronic kidney disease (CKD) rather than alternative descriptions to define and classify severity of CKD; and (v) to use specific kidney measures, such as albuminuria or decreased glomerular filtration rate (GFR), rather than “abnormal” or “reduced” kidney function to describe alterations in kidney structure and function. A proposed 5-part glossary contains specific items for which there was general agreement. Conference attendees acknowledged limitations of the recommendations and glossary, but they considered standardization of scientific nomenclature to be essential for improving communication. Kidney International (2020) 97, 1117–1129; https://doi.org/10.1016/ j.kint.2020.02.010 KEYWORDS: acute kidney diseases and disorders; acute kidney injury; chronic kidney disease; kidney disease; kidney failure; kidney function; kidney measures; nomenclature; patient-centeredness; precision medicine Copyright ª 2020, International Society of Nephrology. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is