Consuming a large amount of protein quickly — especially all-you-can-eat hot pot and buffet — is a common eating habit in Taiwan, but it can increase susceptibility to kidney problems in the long term, a Taipei-based doctor said yesterday.
“Chronic kidney disease is already a global trend. In Taiwan, 10 percent of the population, or about 2 million people, have chronic kidney disease, 90 percent of whom did not know they have it,” Taipei City Hospital Zhongxiao Branch Division of Nephrology director Chen Ta-lung (陳達隆) said.
“The symptoms of chronic kidney disease include fatigue, swelling and anemia, among others, which might be difficult to detect. That is a crucial reason why chronic kidney disease goes undetected,” Chen said.
The top 10 high-risk groups for chronic kidney disease are people with diabetes, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, a family history of kidney disease, high blood cholesterol levels, renal failure, metabolic syndrome, users of herbal medicine, older people and long-term users of painkillers, Chen said.
People in these groups should have health checks on a regular basis, Chen said.
The recommended daily protein intake is between 0.8g and 1g per kilogram of body weight, “but people with chronic kidney disease should only consume between 0.6g to 0.8g of protein per kilo,” Chen said.
“People should also avoid consuming large amounts of protein in a short period of time, which can cause a heavy burden on the kidneys,” he added.
Chen cited the case of a 65-year-old male patient with a history of high blood pressure who had his condition under control.
However, the man frequently drank about 1,000ml of milk in a short period of time while eating a large amount of seawater fish.
The man’s protein intake was too high and a blood test revealed that his renal function index was elevated, Chen said, adding that he was diagnosed with chronic kidney disease.
A balanced diet should be maintained, involving low levels of oil, sodium and sugar, and binge-eating should be avoided, Chen said.
He also discouraged people from taking painkillers without discretion and recommended checking for undissolved bubbles in the urine to avoid chronic kidney disease, hemodialysis or death.
A group of Taiwanese-American and Tibetan-American students at Harvard University on Saturday disrupted Chinese Ambassador to the US Xie Feng’s (謝鋒) speech at the school, accusing him of being responsible for numerous human rights violations. Four students — two Taiwanese Americans and two from Tibet — held up banners inside a conference hall where Xie was delivering a speech at the opening ceremony of the Harvard Kennedy School China Conference 2024. In a video clip provided by the Coalition of Students Resisting the CCP (Chinese Communist Party), Taiwanese-American Cosette Wu (吳亭樺) and Tibetan-American Tsering Yangchen are seen holding banners that together read:
UNAWARE: Many people sit for long hours every day and eat unhealthy foods, putting them at greater risk of developing one of the ‘three highs,’ an expert said More than 30 percent of adults aged 40 or older who underwent a government-funded health exam were unaware they had at least one of the “three highs” — high blood pressure, high blood lipids or high blood sugar, the Health Promotion Administration (HPA) said yesterday. Among adults aged 40 or older who said they did not have any of the “three highs” before taking the health exam, more than 30 percent were found to have at least one of them, Adult Preventive Health Examination Service data from 2022 showed. People with long-term medical conditions such as hypertension or diabetes usually do not
POLICE INVESTIGATING: A man said he quit his job as a nurse at Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital as he had been ‘disgusted’ by the behavior of his colleagues A man yesterday morning wrote online that he had witnessed nurses taking photographs and touching anesthetized patients inappropriately in Taipei Tzu Chi Hospital’s operating theaters. The man surnamed Huang (黃) wrote on the Professional Technology Temple bulletin board that during his six-month stint as a nurse at the hospital, he had seen nurses taking pictures of patients, including of their private parts, after they were anesthetized. Some nurses had also touched patients inappropriately and children were among those photographed, he said. Huang said this “disgusted” him “so much” that “he felt the need to reveal these unethical acts in the operating theater
Heat advisories were in effect for nine administrative regions yesterday afternoon as warm southwesterly winds pushed temperatures above 38°C in parts of southern Taiwan, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said. As of 3:30pm yesterday, Tainan’s Yujing District (玉井) had recorded the day’s highest temperature of 39.7°C, though the measurement will not be included in Taiwan’s official heat records since Yujing is an automatic rather than manually operated weather station, the CWA said. Highs recorded in other areas were 38.7°C in Kaohsiung’s Neimen District (內門), 38.2°C in Chiayi City and 38.1°C in Pingtung’s Sandimen Township (三地門), CWA data showed. The spell of scorching