Consensus Document. Recommendations on assessing proteinuria during the diagnosis and follow-up of chronic kidney disease

The presence of persistently high urinary concentrations of protein or albumin is considered a sign of kidney damage. Nowadays, the diagnosis of chronic kidney disease (CKD) is based on the presence of signs of kidney damage together with the estimation of the glomerular filtration rate. The presence of either proteinuria or albuminuria identifies a group of patients with a higher risk of progression of CKD and higher cardiovascular risk. Treatment with angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors or angiotensin-receptor blockers decreases both the progression of CKD and the incidence of cardiovascular events and death in patients with CKD and proteinuria. Thus, proteinuria is currently considered a therapeutic target by itself. Despite the importance of detecting and monitoring proteinuria in the diagnosis and follow-up of CKD, there is no consensus among the clinical practice guidelines published by different scientific societies on the diagnostic cut-off levels, on different sampling procedures, on the units used in laboratory reports or just on whether it should be defined in terms of albuminuria or proteinuria. The goal of this document created with the agreement of the Spanish Society of Clinical Biochemistry and Molecular Pathology (SEQC, representing its Spanish acronym) and the Spanish Society of Nephrology (S.E.N.), is to recommend appropriate guidelines to medical and laboratory physicians for detecting and monitoring proteinuria as a marker of CKD in adults and children. These recommendations are the result of searching, evaluating and summarising current scientific evidence published in the last few years.