Kidneys: Function (Nursing)

00:01 Welcome! This lecture we will be discussing the urinary system.

00:07 The kidney is the major organ of the urinary system.

00:12 The kidneys, a major excretory organ maintain our body's internal environment by regulating the total water volume and total solute concentration in water.

00:25 Regulating our ion concentrations in our extracellular fluid and ensuring long-term acid-base balance.

00:34 Also, it's going to regulate the total water volume and total solute by excreting metabolic waste, toxins and drugs.

00:44 It's going to produce renin which is a molecule that regulates blood pressure and erythropoietin, a molecule that regulates red blood cell production.

00:56 Also in the kidneys, We're going to activate vitamin D, and also carry out gluconeogenesis if needed.

01:06 It the kidneys are part of the urinary system which includes the ureters which are going to transport urine from the kidneys to the urinary bladder.

01:17 The urinary bladder, which is our temporary storage reservoir for urine.

01:23 And the urethra, which is going to transport urine out of the body.

01:29 While a 180 liters of fluid go through the kidneys each day.

01:34 The majority of it is going to be reabsorbed and only 1.5 liters will be excreted.

01:41 The kidneys will filter the blood plasma about 60 times per day.

01:48 The filtrate is going to be produced by glomerular filtration.

01:54 This is basically the blood plasma - the proteins.

01:59 Urine is going to be produced from this filtrate.

02:03 And contains our metabolic waste and all other unneeded substances that we want to get rid of from the body.

02:12 There are three processes that are going to be involved in the formation of urine as well as the adjustment of our blood composition.

02:22 First, we have glomerular filtration, which is going to produce cell and protein free filtrate.

02:30 After this, we have tubular reabsorption.

02:33 This is going to selectively return about 99% of the substances from the filtrate back to the blood and are renal tubules and collecting ducts.

02:46 Then we have tubular secretion.

02:49 This is going to selectively move substances from the blood to the filtrate in the renal tubules and collecting ducts.