PolyU Research Impact – Smart Clinical Device for Kidney Disease Management

Abstract

Efficient clinical management of chronic kidney disease (CKD) is crucial for public health, as it is a progressive condition that affects 10% of the global population. Early diagnosis and active monitoring play a vital role in effectively treating and prognosing the common pathological pathway from CKD to end-stage renal disease (ESRD), which is characterised by renal fibrosis. Researchers from the Department of Health Technology and Informatics of the Hong Kong Polytechnic University have developed Smart-CKD (S-CKD), a computer-aided diagnostic tool. It integrates ultrasound data and selected clinical variables to provide clinical insights and assesses the risk of moderate-to-severe renal fibrosis progression in CKD patients. The implementation of S-CKD holds the potential to assist healthcare practitioners in tailoring medical judgments and optimising post-treatment protocols for CKD patients. By utilising non-invasive medical imaging results and basic demographic data, this tool offers a cost-effective solution for guiding patient management, thereby contributing to notable clinical advantages. Specifically, S-CKD integrates three pivotal clinical parameters - age, ultrasonic renal length, end-diastolic flow velocity of the interlobar renal artery - which could be collected through regular clinical follow-ups. By leveraging machine learning, S-CKD integrates these data, resulting in a promising diagnostic efficiency of 80%. While renal biopsy remains the gold standard for diagnosing and staging renal fibrosis, its invasive nature imposes limitations in conducting multiple observations, follow-ups, and having potential complications. Therefore, there is a pressing need to develop a non-invasive biomarker for precise monitoring and clinical management of renal fibrosis and its progression. Significantly, S-CKD is accessible through both an online web-based platform and an offline document-based format, making it a user-friendly auxiliary instrument for flexible clinical applications. It is a real-time, reliable, and non-invasive tool that assists medical practitioners in assessing renal fibrosis risk in CKD patients during routine clinical practices. This diagnostic approach plays a crucial role in guiding treatment decisions, improving patient prognosis, and subsequently offering advantages in clinical management, counselling, decision-making on treatment regimens, and scheduling follow-ups.