Reference Ranges of Microalbumin Using Fasting Urine

Fasting Urine을 사용한 Microalbumin의 참고치에 관한 연구

Microalbuminuria is most frequently caused by kidney damage from diabetes. Moreover, many other conditions can lead to kidney damage, such as high blood pressure, heart failure, cirrhosis, or systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE). The measurement of the microalbumin in urine may be useful for the early diagnosis or as a predictor of nephropathy in diabetes. The most common method for getting a quantitative measurement of urinary protein relies on a 24-hour urine collection. The result of this method is accurate. But 24hr urine collection is difficult to obtain and variations in volume are frequent. Also the patients complain about urine collection. We tried to measure reference values for microalbumin using fasting urine and compare them with the albumin/creatinine ratio using 24hr urine. The concentrations of microalbumin in fasting urine and 24hr urine were $7.1{\pm}3.8mg/L$, $5.7{\pm}2.9mg/L$ (r=0.61, p=0.27), respectively. The albumin/creatinine ratios using fasting urine and 24hr urine were $8.7{\pm}4.2{\mu}g/mg$, $8.7{\pm}4.0{\mu}g/mg$ (r=0.76, p=0.88), respectively. This study indicated that the measurement of microalbumin in fasting urine was an easy and simple method for early diagnosis or to predict nephropathy in diabetes. Thus, setting up the reference value using fasting urine may be useful in the screening test for the diabetic nephropathy patients instead of using the 24hr albumin excretion rate (AER).