In 1913, Dr. Henry Christian (first Chief of Medicine at Brigham Hospital in Boston) and his colleague Dr. James White prescribed low-protein diets for kidney patients. They saw that lowering dietary protein enabled those with kidney disease to live longer, but they didn't know why the diet worked. The point is, the low-protein concept isn't new. But, as one doctor pointed out, "low protein diets are difficult to follow. It's hard enough trying to get people to give up cigarettes, let alone steak dinners.

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Dr. Mackenzie Walser Johns Hopkins University Medical Center followed the work begun in 1913 on low protein diets improving kidney functioning. By 1957 he took this further, combining ACE inhibitors, low protein diets (0.3 grams/kilogram of body weight), alkalinity, correcting anemia, supplementing with essential amino acids he had some success in halting end stage renal disease. If individuals only dropped the protein intake and took the essential amino acids [Calwood Amines], 30% of individuals were affected positively. If they took ACE inhibitors 40% of individuals were affected. But with the combination of both this figure jumped to 90% decrease in proteinuria. Dr. Walser discovered that serum albumin can be increased by eliminating dietary proteins and supplementing with essential amino acids, useful for many dialysis patients. Another study found it was the essential amino acid leucine that helped raise albumin. There is one small problem with Dr. Walser's recommendations especially for PKD'rs. Dr. Walser was unaware that with PKD we have a much higher chance of developing kidney stones, calcium kidney stones, one of the most common kinds of kidney stones. This is exactly what happened to the early PKD models (1996) when they were given sodium bicarb. This is the alkalizer recommended by Dr. Walser. For us with PKD, sodium bicarbonate will result in a high incidence of kidney stone formation. PKD'rs have higher levels of calcium in our urine. When given sodium bicarbonate, the sodium comes flying off and our excess calcium (with PKDrs) hooks up with the bicarbonate creating calcium bicarbonate, one of the most common kidney stones formed by PKDrs. A trial is underway in Italy for a very low protein diet and chronic kidney disease.