Japanese clinical practice guidelines for IgA nephropathy: Difference from KDIGO guidelines

In Japan, the Progressive Renal Dysfunction Research Group of the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare (MHLW) and the Japanese Society of Nephrology (JSN) developed the Clinical Practice Guides for Immunoglobulin A (IgA) Nephropathy (IgAN) for the first time in 1995. Thereafter, they published its second version in 2002 and third version in 2011. Meanwhile, the Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes (KDIGO) published the Clinical Practice Guidelines for Glomerulonephritis in 2011. The Progressive Renal Dysfunction Research Group of MHLW and JSN developed the Clinical Practice Guidelines for Immunoglobulin A Nephropathy 2014 as an evidence-based guideline to make it more suitable for clinical practice in Japan. In this article, we describe the outlines of the Japanese guidelines and the differences between the Japanese and KDIGO guidelines. These practical guidelines provide evidence-based optimum treatment and will lead to new clinical trials raised from clinical questions in IgAN.