Acute Kidney Injury
Climate change and health
Dr Muzamil Olamide Hassan and Dr Raina Ramnath are working to evaluate heat stress and the incidence of acute kidney injury in agricultural workers in Ile-Ife, Nigeria.
Global warming is an imminent issue that poses a great danger to human health. Among the many projected health impacts, our rising temperatures are predicted to adversely affect kidney function, especially in low and middle-income countries.
In Nigeria, the temperature has risen significantly, by 1.4 degrees Celsius from 1961 to 2021. In this study, Dr Muzamil Olamide Hassan from Obafemi Awolowo University and Dr Raina Ramnath from the University of Bristol will assess whether these high temperatures are putting agricultural workers in Ile-Ife, Nigeria more at risk of developing acute kidney injury.
To do this, the team will recruit agricultural workers during the wet seasons (using cool temperatures as a baseline) and follow up with them during the hot seasons. Blood and urine will be collected for analysis and the amount of fluid they are drinking will be recorded. Established and new markers of kidney damage, commonly used to detect advanced and early kidney damage respectively, will be used to determine whether they can detect early kidney damage among study participants.
The study aims to provide a clearer picture of the status of kidney damage in agricultural workers, so that effective options for intervention can be implemented to protect kidney health. Drawing from this work, there is potential to develop a convenient testing tool for detecting kidney disease in agricultural workers in Nigeria.