How Do Our Kidney Function

The kidneys are two, flat, bean-shaped, solid organs that are among the most important in our body. They lie on each side of the spine near the waistline. They are about ten centimeters long.

The kidneys help the body by removing unwanted substances. It is just as important for the body to be able to get rid of what it does not need and cannot use as it is for it to take in what it needs. But kidneys at the same time see that other materials are kept in the body. They also regulate the amount of water and other substances in the blood.

In the outer part of each kidney, capillaries from tine loops that make up a ball-like shape covered by a delicate membrane. In each kidney there are about 1, 500, 00 of tiny small balls, called “glomeruli”. More blood flows through the kidneys every minute than through any other organ. The glomeruli allow some of the fluid of the blood which carries the finest dissolved materials to pass through the membranes.

The fluid that passes through is called “Urine”. It is collected with in a cuplike wall which covers each glomerulus. A very delicate tube, called a “tubule”, drains the urine from the cups.

As the urine flows through the tiny tubules, the lining cells are busy exchanging materials between the blood and urine. Substances that the body needs are taken back into the blood. Much of water in tubules also returns to the blood. In this way the kidneys help to keep the body properly moist. The Kidney tubules also help regulate the acid level in the blood.

All the small tubules collect in the inner part of each kidney and open into a delicate sac, the pelvis of the kidney. The Urine then goes down two tubes, called “Ureters” that connect to the kidneys to bladder.