A new study conducted on rats and a pilot group of patients with chronic kidney disease shows that a low-calorie diet that mimics the effects of fasting could show signs of reversing kidney damage and potentially help treat kidney disease. The specially tailored diet proved to be safe in humans and showed positive effects on kidney health that lasted up to a year.
These results support growing evidence that fasting-like diets promote organ regeneration and can reverse some chronic diseases, according to the US study. Chronic kidney disease represents a major health challenge worldwide. A key reason for this is that the disease damages valuable kidney cells, called podocytes, which normally do not regenerate in patients.
Some scientists see potential in low-carb ketogenic diets or low-protein diets. Another promising method is fasting-like diets that are based on filling, low-calorie foods and appear to have anti-inflammatory and healing properties. Valentina Villani and her team from California developed and tested a low-salt version of a fasting-like diet specifically tailored to counteract kidney damage. In rats with kidney damage, it reduced excessive protein in the urine (proteinuria) and activated regenerative mechanisms in podocytes and other kidney cells.
In a pilot study with humans, 13 patients with chronic kidney disease followed these guidelines in five-day cycles for three months. Patients showed improvements in proteinuria, better renal endothelial function and lower levels of inflammation, with these positive effects lasting up to a year after stopping this diet. Villani and her colleagues conclude: “These encouraging preliminary results support the feasibility of fasting-like diets.” Large, randomized clinical studies are now needed to test whether the regenerative and disease-reversing effects observed in rats also occur in humans.
