chronic kidney disease stages

About chronic kidney disease (CKD)

With chronic kidney disease, the kidneys don’t usually fail all at once. Instead, kidney disease often progresses slowly over a period of years. This is good news because if CKD is caught early, medicines and lifestyle changes may help slow its progress and keep you feeling your best for as long as possible.

To help improve the quality of care for people with kidney disease, the National Kidney Foundation (NKF) created a guideline to help doctors identify each level of kidney disease. The NKF divided kidney disease into five stages. When the doctor knows what stage of kidney disease a person has they can provide the best care, as each stage calls for different tests and treatments.

Below shows the five stages of CKD and GFR for each stage:
Stage 1 with normal or high GFR (GFR > 90 ml/min)
Stage 2 Mild CKD (GFR = 60-89 ml/min)
Stage 3 Moderate CKD (GFR = 30-59 ml/min)
Stage 4 Severe CKD (GFR = 15-29 ml/min)
Stage 5 End Stage CKD (GFR <15 ml/min)

Dialysis or a kidney transplant needed in order to maintain health.