Kidney Steps: A 5-Step Survival Guide for People With Diabetes, Hypertension, or Kidney Issues

An award-winning, 5-step survival guide for individuals at risk for or with kidney disease, including people with diabetes and hypertension, the two leading causes of kidney disease. The book is written by a kidney transplant donor and a kidney transplant recipient, and is edited by a leading nephrologist. It includes recent research, current statistics, and patient interviews. The book is written in understandable English. The 5 steps begin with "your odds" quizzes to help readers determine their risks for developing kidney disease and surviving the disease, or dialysis, or transplant. Step 2 is devoted to current information on kidney disease and the factors leading to it--diabetes, hypertension, obesity. The subjects covered in Step 2 are progressive, moving from kidney anatomy and function; through disease causes and diagnosis; to dialysis and transplantation. The interspersed interviews, statistics, and applicable research give each chapter variety and add interest. KidneyStep 3 encourages self-management of health conditions and a lifestyle approach. It discusses depression in kidney patients and the often-ignored possibility of death as an alternative to dialysis. KidneyStep 4 is about nutrition and diet and is particularly relevant to diabetes and hypertension, the leading causes of kidney damage. The chapters provide a medically-sound diet plan and recipes. KidneyStep 5 encourages physical activity and provides both beginning and more advanced exercise suggestions designed by an exercise physiologist and demonstrated by the kidney-donor author.

Author Vicki L. Hulett, a lawyer, inherited a kidney disease that destroyed all kidney function. Vicki’s daughter Jennifer L. Waybright, the other author and a nurse, donated a kidney to save Vicki’s life. They wrote this book to alert others at risk for kidney disease that the disease often can be slowed or stopped, especially for people with diabetes and hypertension. KidneySteps includes 5 steps for better health and to prevent further kidney damage.