”Chronic kidney disease – the silent killer” is no alarmist talk. According to the latest statistics, the world’s population suffering from kidney disease has exceeded 500 million, chronic kidney disease has become a global public health problem. The situation in China is also extremely serious, in order to promote the awareness of the whole society on kidney disease, the International Society of Nephrology and the International Kidney Foundation jointly proposed that the second Thursday of March every year be established as “World Kidney Day” to inspire the world to work together to curb chronic kidney disease. The end stage of chronic kidney disease is chronic renal failure (uremic phase), which can only be sustained by dialysis (hemodialysis or peritoneal dialysis) or kidney transplantation. Currently, more than 1 million people around the world are surviving on dialysis, with an average annual increase of 8%. Moreover, there is a trend of younger onset of chronic kidney disease. Unfortunately, while chronic kidney disease is rising globally, there is a general lack of public knowledge about the prevention and treatment of the disease. Kidney disease is a silent killer Kidney disease usually starts with no symptoms, and only when the destruction of kidney function is greater than 75% will patients experience weakness, nausea, vomiting, bloating, anorexia, high blood pressure, urine taste in the mouth, dark skin and scorched hair. It is only then that people go to the hospital, but they often do not know which department to go to. Those with poor appetite see the gastroenterology department, those with anemia go to the hematology department, and few people think that it is the kidneys that are wrong. Therefore, many patients with kidney failure have taken the wrong path of misdiagnosis and omission, and when they wait for nephrology consultation, they can only maintain their lives through hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis or kidney transplantation in the end. In fact, the onset of kidney failure is not sudden, just that patients do not care about it. Compared with other major diseases that endanger human health, chronic kidney disease is more insidious, and most patients do not have obvious symptoms when they start, so it is not easy to attract attention. In addition, China’s limited medical resources, many people, especially in rural areas, lack of regular medical checkups, and even if the checkups, some units only do kidney ultrasound, many chronic kidney disease is missed, which is also the cause of kidney disease is not easy to be detected early. Early manifestations of chronic kidney disease These conditions may be a sign of early kidney disease, should promptly seek medical attention: urine foam more, does not disappear for a long time, indicating that more protein excreted in the urine; urine discoloration, a strong tea color, wash water-like, soy sauce color or cloudy like rice water, indicating that there may be red cells or white cells inside; too much or too little urine; increased nocturia, normal people within 60 years of age should not generally have nocturia, if increased nocturia in young people is likely to be an early manifestation of kidney malfunction; edema of the eyelids or face after waking up in the morning; soreness of the lower back without a clear cause, etc. There are many factors in the development of kidney disease, some are related to genetics, but more are related to other diseases and lifestyles. For asymptomatic high-risk people without any symptoms (such as those with hypertension, diabetes, gout, hyperlipidemia), it is best to have more than one routine urine examination per year, and if proteinuria, hematuria and other problems are found, further kidney function tests and other items should be done, and specialist treatment and follow-up should be conducted; secondly, regular examination and specialist treatment and follow-up for people who have been diagnosed with kidney disease. Through screening of asymptomatic high-risk groups, patients with early chronic kidney disease can be detected. Especially in the early stages of chronic kidney disease, interventional treatment can effectively slow down the progression of kidney disease. Prevention of chronic kidney disease Chronic kidney disease is not an incurable disease, especially early kidney disease, and can be well controlled by improving lifestyle and actively preventing and treating related diseases. Many patients find that kidney function is declining and then enter into many misunderstandings, especially fearful, always thinking “how long can I live” “do I need dialysis” “can I still work and exercise? “, some of them rush to the doctor, resulting in irreversible progressive damage to kidney function. In fact, even if you have kidney disease, the deterioration of kidney function can be avoided with proper treatment, and some patients’ kidney function can even be reversed. Knowing that you have kidney disease, first of all, you should realize that you have changed, but at the same time, it should be clear that you can still live on as normal and have a good quality of life. So, it is important to take the disease seriously, but do not be intimidated by it. Secondly, we should have the appropriate knowledge that kidney disease is usually a lifelong disease, and we should learn to live with the disease and avoid risk factors such as high blood pressure, high protein diet, infection and indiscriminate use of medication.