Mayo Clinic Health Manager
Get free personalized health guidance for you and your family.
Get Started
About our e-newsletters
- Free e-newsletters
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- We do not share your e-mail address
Housecall, our weekly general-interest e-newsletter, keeps you up to date on a wide variety of health topics with timely, reliable, practical information, recipes, blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts and more. Our biweekly topic-specific e-newsletters also include blogs, questions and answers with Mayo Clinic experts, and other useful information that will help you manage your health.
Housecall Archives
Mayo Clinic Housecall
Stay up to date on the latest health information.
What you get
- Free weekly e-newsletter
- Mayo Clinic expertise
- Recipes, tools and other helpful information
- We do not share your e-mail address
Definition
By Mayo Clinic staffProtein in urine (proteinuria), especially at higher levels, can indicate kidney disease or another serious condition. Protein in urine is usually discovered during a urinalysis — a test to analyze the content of your urine.
Your kidneys filter many substances, including waste products, from your blood. These waste products are then excreted in your urine. Normally, during this filtering process your kidneys retain components — including proteins — that your body needs. But some diseases and conditions can allow proteins to slip through the filters of your kidneys, causing protein in urine.
Low levels of protein in urine are normal, particularly in younger people after exercise or activity. Protein in urine discovered on a microalbumin test may often be the earliest sign of diabetic kidney damage.
- Proteinuria. National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases. http://kidney.niddk.nih.gov/kudiseases/pubs/proteinuria/index.htm. Accessed March 24, 2009.
- Wein AJ, et al. Campbell-Walsh Urology. 9th ed. Philadelphia, Pa.: Saunders Elsevier; 2007:101.
- Ferri FF. Ferri's Clinical Advisor 2009. Philadelphia, Pa.: Mosby Elsevier; 2009:1472.
- Wilkinson JM (expert opinion). Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. April 4, 2009.
