Background and Objectives: Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD) affects 6,7% of the adult population in Romania and is associated with high morbidity. About one out of three adults with diabetes has kidney disease. According to current literature data, the prevalence of diabetes is very high, up to 11,6%, of whom 2,4% had undiagnosed diabetes, and is the leading cause of kidney damage and the need for renal replacement therapy (RRT). COVID-19 has brought with it a lot of unanswered questions, regarding the risk factors, the disease evolution, and the treatment possibilities. It became clear that diabetic kidney disease (DKD) is among the independent risk factors that predict unfavorable outcomes upon SARS-CoV-2 infection, so we aimed to evaluate the characteristics of diabetic and non-diabetic dialyzed patients, COVID-19 positive. Materials and Methods: It is an observational, single-center study that analyzed type 2 diabetes mellitus and non–diabetic patients in maintenance hemodialysis hospitalized for SARS CoV-2 infection. Results: A total of 101 adult dialyzed patients were admitted with a SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR positive test, out of which 42 had a long history of diabetes mellitus type 2 and 59 of them have been known with other etiologies of CKD. Hypertension and heart disease were the most commonly associated comorbidities. Inflammatory markers and anemia were significantly increased in diabetic patients compared to non-diabetic. Conclusions: We found that anemia was more severe in patients COVID-19-positive MHD T2DM patients.
The recent increase in life expectancy is the main argument for a better understanding of the pathophysiological mechanisms underlying aging. These, once known, can provide possible links to therapies to prevent aging or slow down the process. Normal aging is associated with a progressive decrease in the glomerular filtration rate. Accurate estimation of GFR in the elderly is under the suspicion of multiple errors mainly due to sarcopenia and decreased protein intake. Differentiation between chronic kidney disease and the physiological decline of GFR might be a challenge in clinical practice and this has consequences on the evolution and treatment of the numerous comorbidities of the elderly. The current trend to use non-invasive diagnostic techniques explains the need to identify a serological marker to help differentiate between decreased GFR secondary to kidney aging or the development of chronic kidney disease.
