Variations of glomerular properties and their effect on glomerular disease.

The possibility that inherited glomerular properties predispose individuals to certain glomerulopathies is an exciting new hypothesis. It opens new avenues to the investigation and treatment of patients which may be most easily applied in newly diagnosed diabetics and patients with multiple relapses of minimal change nephropathy. These treatments are unlikely to involve dangerous cytotoxic drugs which have been the fruit of years of investigation concentrated on the immune and inflammatory consequences of glomerular diseases. The differences between the two strains also cast doubt on the wisdom of extrapolating results obtained in the Munich Wistar rat to the rest of the animal kingdom.