Renal Dysplasia: Protecting Kidney Function in Children

Renal dysplasia is abnormal development of kidney tissue before birth. The affected kidney contains disorganized tissue, often with cysts, and provides reduced or no function. It is a congenital developmental problem, not an infection acquired after birth, and a single low filtration result does not define it. One kidney, both kidneys or part of a kidney may be affected. For nursing, the central questions are how much working kidney tissue the child has, whether urine drains freely and what the child needs today. Hypoplasia means a small kidney; dysplasia means abnormally formed tissue; hypodysplasia describes overlap of the two. Multicystic dysplastic kidney (MCDK) is a dysplastic pattern in which cysts replace normal tissue and the kidney does not work. NIDDK estimates that between 1 in 1,000 and 1 in 4,300 babies are born with MCDK each year, that boys are affected more often than girls and that MCDK most often involves only one kidney. MCDK is a different condition from inherited polycystic kidney disease. CAKUT (congenital anomalies of the kidney and urinary tract) is the broader group that includes dysplasia;...