Lifestyle changes are also important. Patients should adopt a low-salt diet to reduce edema and improve blood pressure control. Exercise may help mobilize edema and allow natural diuresis, as well as lower blood pressure and improve cholesterol levels.

Treatment success is defined as reduction or resolution of proteinuria, ideally to less than 300 mg/day, with preserved kidney function. Patients who achieve this endpoint generally have a very favorable prognosis. In contrast, those patients with nephrotic-range proteinuria that do not respond to treatment have a poor overall renal prognosis because ongoing glomerular inflammation will eventually lead to scarring and a permanent loss of renal function.