In a recent original investigation by Marino et al in this month’s
issue of Kidney International the authors show that lung ultrasound has
clinical utility beyond the outpatient dialysis unit. Prior work by this Italian group has shown
that the quantitation of B lines on lung ultrasound correlates with
extravascular lung water and mortality in patient’s with ESRD on HD. In the present study the authors quantified B
lines in 42 non-dyspneic patients with active nephrotic syndrome and compared
their findings to healthy controls and to ESKD patients. For each of the three groups lung ultrasound
was performed 5 minutes after lying supine, 60 minutes after lying supine, and
then after standing. They found that the
number of B lines among patients with active nephrotic syndrome was similar to
the number of B lines in chronic dialysis patients. Furthermore they found that B lines in
patients with nephrotic syndrome accumulated while lying supine for 60 minutes
and diminished after standing up.
Further analysis demonstrated a strong indirect relationship between
serum albumin and number of B lines in the nephrotic syndrome cohort. In other words, a lower albumin was
predictive of greater extravascular lung water.
Finally, the authors evaluated a subset of 11 patients that experienced
disease remission. Each of these
patients had significantly fewer B lines compared to ultrasound results during
active disease. Quantitation of B lines
by lung ultrasound can be learned in a single 3 to 4 hour training session and
the procedure takes about four to six minutes to perform. As ultrasound machines become smaller,
cheaper, and more available, lung ultrasound will likely become a critical
component in the assessment of volume status by nephrologists.
Post byDaniel Ross, MD
Hofstra Northwell School of Medicine
No comments:
Post a Comment