The kidneys are the key to understanding why a person's creatinine level would be high. Often, an elevated level of creatinine points directly to the body's filtration system and how that system is functioning. The following article shows the various causes of High creatinine, and how common these diseases or conditions are in the general population. This is not a direct indication as to how commonly these diseases are the actual cause of High creatinine, but gives a relative idea as to how frequent these diseases are seen overall.
High Blood Pressure, Hypertension and Diabetes
Hypertension, high blood pressure and diabetes can cause damage to your body's filtration ability. This ability runs mainly through the kidneys. Damage to the body's filtration can lead to a higher than normal or elevated creatinine level, and all this has a strong connection to kidney function. So the fact that you have a elevated creatinine level could be telling you something far more important about your body, including how you are treating it and what you are putting in it.
Kidney Disease
Diseased kidneys will no longer filter creatinine from the blood effectively; therefore, levels begin to rise. High creatinine is not a good marker for early stage kidney disease, however, because it does not begin to rise until about 40 percent of kidney function has already been lost.
Heart Disease
High creatinine level has been linked to atherosclerosis, or hardening of the arteries. Transient high levels of creatinine can also be caused by different types of heart surgery, such as aneurysm repair or stent insertion. It is important to rule out these causes when evaluating high creatinine levels.
Dehydration
Transient increases in creatinine can be caused by dehydration. Patients with one kidney such as transplant recipients or kidney donors seem to be particularly susceptible to the effect of dehydration on creatinine. It is very important to rule out dehydration as a possible cause of high creatinine in this population because patients may mistakenly believe that their remaining kidney is failing.