Q: My elder brother, aged 30 years, is having chronic renal failure (CRF) and undergoing dialysis twice a week. Is there any recent research which can stop his dialysis? Will ayurvedic treatment work for him? I have seen a couple of cases which came to the hospital when my brother was admitted for the same. They successfully recovered from CRF and now they are not undergoing dialysis but only a monthly check up. Their creatinine has gone down from 10 to 2-3 and urea also has gone down. How did this happen?

A:There currently is no medicine which can correct irreversible CRF. Nor am I aware of any ayurvedic medicines that have scientifically proven to reverse CRF. The best known treatment to come-off of dialysis in the face of CRF is to perform a kidney transplant which offers much better quality of life than dialysis. It is possible that if someone has acute renal failure his kidneys may recover their function and that individual may no longer require dialysis. It is likely that cases you are referring to had acute renal failure and following recovery of kidney function those individuals were taken off dialysis. However, your brother seems to have CRT (as you have described) and if you have any further questions regarding this issue you should consult his nephrologist.