Guest guest Posted March 9, 2001 Report Share Posted March 9, 2001 Thank you for the advice Pierre. You really have no idea how good it is to talk with people about this. I was beginning to think I was the only one. I hope you enjoyed your cheeseburger. My pasta was yummy. =P Pierre L wrote: Hi . I appreciate your kind words about the site. We have had manymessages about diet. If you go to the home page of the group, you can searchthe message archives to quickly get to messages that might be relevant. Forexample, you could search for " diet " .There are as many opinions about this as there are people I think, but myfeeling is that nothing you do in the way of nutrition will have that muchof an effect overall, unless you have very unhealthy dietary habits to beginwith. I think it's important to eat a well-balanced diet, with, as said, good fruits and vegetables. I also believe meat is not a problem,unless you were to eat meats excessively. But the same applies even topeople without kidney disease. As far as the kidneys go, they don't reallycare what you eat, until you've lost enough kidney function that they can'tprocess certain things faster than you put them in (which probably isn'tyour case). After all, it's not the kidneys that digests the food we eat.There may be some advantage in, not a low, but a controlled protein diet.This is lower than the average North American diet, but it ensures enoughhigh quality protein for proper health -- but you really need to have adietician tailor something for you. It's possible that your nephrologistdoesn't believe a controlled protein diet to be necessary. The thinking isthat most people don't really need it, and, if my memory is correct, thereis at least one study that concluded a low protein diet has no particularbenefit when it comes to IgAN specifically (as opposed to kidney disease ingeneral). So, in the end, I suspect that just not going overboard with meatis sufficient. Anyway, if you were eating too much protein, your BUN wouldbe elevated. Nephrologists may sometimes give the impression they don'tcare, but they can tell just about everything they need to know from thatlittle page-long lab report, and a quick glance at how you look.As for salt, you know, the kidneys have an incredible amount of capacity toregulate salt within the body. Unless you have high blood pressure problems,it's probably not necessary to eliminate sodium completely. In fact,eliminating sodium is probably the easiest task a kidney has to do. Again,it's one of those things, where if a person believes reducing salt is betterfor health overall, fine, but if it's just for the kidneys, it probablywon't make much difference. So once again, less salt may be better forhealth, but it really isn't necessary to go to extremes about it (except invery specific cases).Moderation and balance in the diet is probably the way to go - and thatincludes things like coffee, alcohol, meat, salt, etc. Good nutrition helpskeep you healthy, and the healthier you are, the better it is for thekidneys, and most other organs too. Add plenty of exercise to the balanceddiet, and you are probably doing everything that can be done to ensure youstay healthy as long as possible.Now, I just finished my cheeseburger and chips for lunch, and I'm going tohave my afternoon coffee :)Pierre Re: Nutrition> Thanks for the quick response ,> > And for the record, Thank you Pierre for having created this group.> It is the most informative site I have found. It has put an ease in> my head and in my heart concerning all of this. It feels nice to not> be alone with this disease.> Warm regards,> Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted March 10, 2001 Report Share Posted March 10, 2001 You're welcome. I'm not a big fan of Macdonalds, but they just rebuilt the one near where I live, to add a drive-thru window, and as I passed it today in the car, I couldn't resist. I don't eat cheeseburgers every day though It is nice to know you're not alone, isn't it? I know the feeling. I actually didn't know anyone else who had IgAN for the first15 years, at least. Geez, I was lucky if the doctors had ever even heard of it. I'm glad we can have groups like this nowadays. Pierre Re: Nutrition > > > > Thanks for the quick response , > > > And for the record, Thank you Pierre for having created this group. > > It is the most informative site I have found. It has put an ease in > > my head and in my heart concerning all of this. It feels nice to not > > be alone with this disease. > > Warm regards, > > > > > > > > > > Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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