Kidney Damage
3 out of 4 individuals that have lupus may develop kidney damage [8] as the lupus disease progress. One very common renal manifestation is, proteinuria (i.e. the loss of protein in the urine), which is clinically characterized by excessive urine foaming.
Some other symptoms of lupus kidney involvement are:
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Blood in the urine [9] also referred to as Hematuria, which may be a very noticeable sign or not
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Elevated blood creatinine, a sign of kidney failure.
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Hypertension [10]
The most common renal impairment is glomerulonephritis (damage to the renal glomerulus) caused by the deposition of autoantibodies in the renal tissue.
There are about five different types of glomerulonephritis caused by lupus, and they are referred to as lupus nephritis [11]. Each of these nephritis types has their own characteristics symptoms and manifestation.
Therefore, every patient with lupus showing symptoms of kidney damage should undergo a kidney biopsy to identify what kind of damage to the glomerulus that the autoantibodies are causing.
It is perfectly possible for a patient to have two to three classes of lupus nephritis at the same time.