Kidney research, 2026-08-10
Kidney-protecting diabetes drugs are a big theme today: GLP-1 medicines (the Ozempic family) and SGLT2 inhibitors like dapagliflozin, which looked helpful even in children. Blood pressure drugs called RAS blockers were also tied to fewer new cases of kidney disease in people with type 2 diabetes. Most of the rest of today's sweep is early research just getting started, so there are few new results yet.
Podocin Oligomerization links Slit Diaphragm Architecture and NPHS2 Genetics
The kidney's filter is built from tiny cells called podocytes, joined by a sieve called the slit diaphragm that keeps protein in the blood. This study mapped how a protein named...
Heme-induced kallikrein-kinin system activation in hemolytic uremic syndrome
In a disease called hemolytic uremic syndrome, red blood cells break apart and release a substance called heme. This lab study looked at how heme switches on a blood-clotting and...
Spectrum of Anti–Factor B-Associated Glomerular Diseases in Adults
Some people make antibodies that attack part of their own immune system called factor B, which can damage the kidney's tiny filters. Researchers described which kidney diseases...
Key Elements of Clinical Communication After Inpatient Acute Kidney Injury: Modified Delphi Study From the AKINow Recovery Workgroup
After a sudden drop in kidney function in the hospital (acute kidney injury, or AKI), care often slips when patients go home. A panel of experts agreed on the key things hospital...
The therapeutic approach to cardiovascular–kidney–metabolic syndrome
This review covers how to treat cardiovascular-kidney-metabolic syndrome, when heart, kidney, and metabolic problems like diabetes happen together. The authors lay out screening...
A Phase III Study to Investigate the Efficacy and Safety of Elecoglipron Compared With Placebo in Adults With Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus and Impaired Renal Function on Background Dapagliflozin
A large phase 3 trial is starting to test a drug called elecoglipron against a placebo (dummy pill) in adults with type 2 diabetes and reduced kidney function. Everyone also takes...
Assessment of the Impact of Repeated Ischemic Preconditioning Episodes on Hemodynamic and Metabolic Parameters in Patients at Various Stages of Chronic Kidney Disease
This study is testing whether short, controlled cutoffs of blood flow to a limb ("ischemic preconditioning") can protect people at different stages of kidney disease. Researchers...
A Study to Find Out How EMPAgliflozin is Tolerated and if it Helps Children and Adolescents With Chronic KIDNEY Disease (EMPA-KIDNEY® Kids)
This trial tests empagliflozin, a kidney-protecting diabetes drug, in children aged 2 to 17 with chronic kidney disease. Kids are randomly given the drug or a placebo (dummy pill)...
Study of the Quality of Life in School Aged-children With Posterior Urethral Valves
Posterior urethral valves are a birth defect that blocks the urethra in boys and can slowly harm the kidneys. Up to half of these children later develop chronic kidney disease....
EASi-KIDNEY™ (The Studies of Heart & Kidney Protection With BI 690517 in Combination With Empagliflozin)
This trial tests a new drug, BI 690517, added to empagliflozin in adults with chronic kidney disease who are at risk of getting worse. People with or without diabetes can join,...
A Study of Orforglipron (LY3502970) on Cardiovascular Outcomes in Adults With Atherosclerotic Cardiovascular Disease and/or Chronic Kidney Disease (ATTAIN-Outcomes)
This 5-year trial tests orforglipron, a pill in the GLP-1 family, against a placebo in adults with heart disease and/or chronic kidney disease. It will measure heart-related...
Real-World Study of Enarodustat for Anemia in Non-Dialysis CKD Patients
This real-world study will follow 90 adults with chronic kidney disease (not on dialysis) who have low blood counts (anemia) and take a pill called enarodustat. Researchers will...
Niaoduqing Granules in Older Adults With Impaired Kidney Function
This study will follow about 300 adults over 60 with stage 3 to 5 kidney disease who take an herbal medicine called Niaoduqing Granules. Researchers want to see if it slows kidney...
Outcomes of Physiologic Insulin Resensitization (PIR) in Patients With Chronic Kidney Disease and Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus
This study looks at "physiologic insulin resensitization," a way of giving insulin, in people with chronic kidney disease and type 2 diabetes. Researchers want to see how it...
A Study of Eloralintide (LY3841136) in Participants With Renal Impairment and in Participants With Normal Renal Function
This small study measures how a drug called eloralintide moves through the body in people with reduced kidney function, compared with healthy people. It runs about 14 weeks per...
A Study to Evaluate Safety, Tolerability and Efficacy of AP306 at Fixed Doses in Dialysis Participants With Hyperphosphatemia
This study tests a drug called AP306 in adults on dialysis who have too much phosphate in their blood, a common and dangerous problem. It checks safety and whether fixed doses...
Intensification of Blood Pressure Lowering Therapeutics Based on Diuretics Versus Usual Management for Uncontrolled Hypertension IN Patients With Moderate to Severe Chronic Kidney Disease
This trial tests whether pushing blood pressure lower with water-pill (diuretic) treatment beats usual care in people with moderate to severe kidney disease and hard-to-control...
Retinal Changes in Chronic Kidney Disease: A Spectral-Domain Optical Coherence Tomography Study Correlated with Biochemical Parameters.
Researchers used an eye scan called OCT to look at the retina, the light-sensing layer at the back of the eye, in people with chronic kidney disease. They found retinal changes...
Urinary Dickkopf-3 reflects renal and vascular damage in diabetic kidney disease: A cross-sectional study.
This study measured a protein called Dickkopf-3 in the urine of people with diabetic kidney disease. Higher levels tracked with more damage to the kidneys and blood vessels. It was...
Safety and efficacy of glucagon like peptide-1 receptor agonism-based therapies in end-stage renal disease: A systematic review and meta-analysis.
This combines many studies (a meta-analysis) of GLP-1 drugs, the class that includes Ozempic, in people with kidney failure, including those on dialysis. It weighed how safe and...
Individualizing pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic therapy for CKD associated with diabetes.
This is a guide for doctors on tailoring treatment for people who have both kidney disease and diabetes. It covers medicines and non-drug steps, and it stresses matching the plan...
Effect of semaglutide on kidney outcomes in the SELECT, FLOW, and SOUL trials: a prespecified pooled analysis.
This pooled three large trials, called SELECT, FLOW, and SOUL, to measure how the drug semaglutide affects the kidneys. It checked whether semaglutide protects kidney health over...
Treatment outcomes and safety of telitacicept in reducing proteinuria and hematuria for refractory childhood IgA vasculitis nephritis
This looked at a drug called telitacicept in children with a hard-to-treat kidney inflammation (IgA vasculitis nephritis). It tracked whether the drug lowered protein and blood in...
Implementation of KDIGO CKD Screening and Its Prognostic Implications in Community-Dwelling Adults Aged 75 Years or Older: A Population-Based Cohort Study
This rolled out standard kidney-disease screening (the KDIGO checkup) for community-living adults aged 75 and older, then followed what happened to them. It looked at how well the...
Cardiometabolic risk, evaluation and control in lupus nephritis
Lupus can attack the kidneys, a problem called lupus nephritis. This review looks at how to check for and control heart and metabolic risks in these patients, like high blood...
Balancing risk: anemia or albuminuria when using ACEi/ARB?
ACE inhibitors and ARBs are common blood pressure drugs that also protect kidneys by cutting protein in the urine. But they can sometimes lower red blood cell counts, causing...
Asymptomatic kidney changes discovered during occupational health screening: age-dependent trends from a large cohort
In a large group of workers screened at their jobs, quiet kidney changes with no symptoms became more common with age. This shows a pattern in a population; it does not prove what...
Dapagliflozin preserves kidney function and reduces albuminuria in children with chronic kidney disease
This study looked at dapagliflozin, a diabetes and kidney drug, in children with chronic kidney disease. It reported steadier kidney function and less protein in the urine. Because...
Glomerular-Targeted Delivery of Low-Dose Prednisolone Attenuates Established Lupus Nephritis in MRL/lpr Mice.
Researchers used a delivery system to send a low dose of the steroid prednisolone straight to the kidney's filters in mice with a lupus-like kidney disease. It calmed the kidney...
Prevention of new-onset chronic kidney disease with renin–angiotensin system blockers in type 2 diabetes with preserved kidney function
In people with type 2 diabetes whose kidneys still worked normally, taking blood-pressure drugs called RAS blockers (ACE inhibitors or ARBs) was linked to fewer new cases of...
Idiopathic nodular glomerulopathy
This is a medical write-up about a kidney disease called idiopathic nodular glomerulopathy. In this disease, scar-like lumps build up in the kidney's tiny filters and slowly damage...
Calcineurin inhibitor versus mycophenolate mofetil along with rituximab in non-genetic calcineurin inhibitor resistant steroid resistant nephrotic syndrome: retrospective observation from western India
This study compared two treatments in people whose nephrotic syndrome did not get better with steroids. One group got a drug called a calcineurin inhibitor; the other got...
CKD screening: urinary albumin or uDKK3 or both?
This is a discussion piece about the best way to screen for kidney disease. It weighs the usual urine test for protein (albumin) against a newer urine marker called uDKK3, and asks...
A young male with kidney damage from genetic mitochondrial disease: case report and literature review
This is a report of a single young man whose kidneys were damaged by an inherited mitochondrial disease, a problem in the tiny energy factories inside our cells. One person's case...
Genetic and environmental risk factors for intracranial aneurysm and subarachnoid haemorrhage among patients with Autosomal Dominant Polycystic Kidney Disease
This study looked at what raises the risk of a bulge in a brain blood vessel (an aneurysm) and its bursting in people with polycystic kidney disease (ADPKD), an inherited disease...
The Urine Ammonium-pH Index is a Measure of Kidney Tubular Function
Researchers tested a simple urine measure, the urine ammonium-pH index, as a sign of how well the kidney's tiny tubes are working. In their data it matched tube function and helped...
Chronic Kidney Disease Mineral and Bone Disorder (CKD-MBD) Medication Titration Practices in Hemodialysis Patients in the US
This study looked at how U.S. doctors adjust the medicines used for bone and mineral problems in dialysis patients. It reviewed records from 23,549 people on in-center dialysis...
NKF Live: Biogen PREVAIL Trial
This is a patient webinar from the National Kidney Foundation about the PREVAIL trial, which is testing a drug called felzartamab in adults with IgA nephropathy, a disease where...
Self-Management Data and Disease Progression in Chronic Kidney Disease
This study follows people with chronic kidney disease who use a phone app to track blood pressure, blood sugar, medicines, and diet. Researchers want to see if steady self-tracking...
The role of gut microbiome disruption in the development of metabolic dysfunction-associated kidney disease.
This article reviews how an unhealthy balance of gut bacteria may help drive kidney disease linked to metabolic problems like obesity and diabetes. It pulls together existing...
Association Between Dietary Magnesium Intake and All-Cause Mortality in Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease: Insights from NHANES 1999-2018.
This study asked whether people with kidney disease who eat more magnesium live longer. It used a large U.S. health survey covering 1999 to 2018. It found a link between more...
Integrated Analysis of Zinc, Copper, and Magnesium Homeostasis in Pediatric Idiopathic Nephrotic Syndrome: A Prospective Cohort Study with Serial Clinical Evaluation
Researchers tracked levels of three minerals, zinc, copper, and magnesium, in children with nephrotic syndrome, a kidney problem that leaks protein into the urine. They followed...
Change of prognostic nutritional index after three months of initial hemodialysis is a predictor of long-term outcomes for patients with uremia
This study checked whether the change in a combined nutrition-and-immune score (the prognostic nutritional index) during the first three months of dialysis predicts how patients do...
The Therapeutic Application of Epigenetic Regulation by Natural Herbal Compounds in Kidney Diseases.
This is a review of lab research on natural herbal compounds and how they might switch kidney-disease genes on or off. That on/off control is called epigenetics. It pulls together...
Regulatory Frameworks and Technical Bottlenecks for Clinical Translation of the Bioartificial Kidney.
This lays out the rules and technical hurdles blocking the bioartificial kidney, a lab-built device meant to do a real kidney's job. It explains what still has to be solved before...
Proteomic Identification of Pig Xenoantigens for Clinical Xenotransplantation.
Scientists used protein-mapping tools to find the pig molecules that a human immune system would attack after a pig-kidney transplant. Knowing these targets could help make pig...