Fasting Ramadan in Chronic Kidney Disease (CKD), Kidney Transplant and Dialysis Patients: Review and Update

Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a common disease in the Islamic regions. Dehydration occurs after prolonged fasting, particularly in hot and humid climates. In the Arabic months’ calendar, Ramadan is a month of maximum given deeds, where Muslims are required to fast from dawn till sunset. Depending on where you live and when the Ramadan month falls, fasting might last anywhere from 10 to 20 hours or more. In certain circumstances, such as poorly controlled diabetes and advanced CKD patients who are allowed to break their fast, the Ramadan fasting amendment is viable. Some Muslims, however, continue fasting despite these circumstances, placing themselves at risk, which is not allowed in the Islamic religion. There are no medical recommendations that specify who should and should not fast. Nonetheless, the recommendations have been extracted from several published studies. The authors searched EMBASE, PubMed, Google Scholar, and Google for publications, research, and reviews. All authors debate and analyze the related articles. Each author was assigned a part or two of the topics to read, study, and summarize before creating the final draft of their given section. Then this comprehensive review was completed after discussion sessions. In conclusion, by the Islamic religion view, fasting Ramadan is mandatory for every wise adult person. People who have chronic diseases or that may deteriorate by fasting are exempted from fasting. It seems that fasting and the associated disease hours are determinant factors to fasting or not fasting. Up to our knowledge, there are no established guidelines for CKD patients and physicians to follow; however, the International Diabetes Federation and Diabetes and Ramadan (IDF-DAR) Practical Guidelines 2021 have been issued for CKD diabetic patients and fasting.