SPECTRUM OF NEPHROPATHIES WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO PRIMARY GLOMERULOPATHIES

A retrospective study was carried out where histopathology records of Department of Pathology, Armed Forces Medical College, Pune were scrutinised covering a period of 10 years. We came across 325 cases of nephropathies. The sample comprised of 92.6% adults and 7.4% children. 79.7% were males and 20.3% were females. The patient population comprised of 35.1% serving soldiers, 37.8% their family members and 27.1% not related to Armed Forces. The study is based on only light microscopy findings. It was observed that primary glomerular disease was the commonest entity and comprised of 61.5% of all the nephropathies. Acute diffuse proliferative glomerulonephritis was not only the commonest primary glomerulopathy (23.5%) but the commonest nephropathy as well. The other primary glomerulopathies in descending order of frequency were, membranoproliferative glomerulonephritis (22.5%), mesangioproliferative glomerulonephritis (21.5%), chronic glomerulonephritis (9%), minimal change disease (7.5%), membranous glomerulopathy (7%), focal segmental glomerulosclerosis (5%) and crescentic glomerulonephritis (4%). We had only 14 cases (4.3% of all nephropathies) of secondary glomerulopathies, amongst which amyloidosis was the commonest cause. We came across 2 cases (0.6% of all nephropathies) of Alport's syndrome. In the other nephropathies, 22.2% were tubulointerstitial diseases and 5.5% were malignant kidney tumors. In 5.8% renal biopsies, no significant pathology was seen on light microscopy.