Is podocyte injury relevant in diabetic nephropathy? Studies in patients with type 2 diabetes

Podocyte structural changes have been suggested to be involved in the pathogenesis of albuminuria in diabetes. We evaluated podocytes density, number, and structure in 67 white patients with type 2 diabetes: 21 normoalbu-minuric (NA), 23 microalbuminuric (MA), and 23 pro-teinuric (P). Kidney function and biopsy studies were performed; 20 kidney donors served as control subjects. Electron microscopic morphometric analysis was used to estimate numerical density of podocytes per glomer-ulus [Nv(epi/glom)], filtration slit length density per glomerulus (FSLv/glom), and foot process width (FPW). The number of podocytes per glomerulus (Epi N/glom) was obtained by multiplying Nv(epi/glom) by mean glo-merular volume. Nv(epi/glom) was significantly de-creased in all type 2 diabetic groups compared wit