BACKGROUND: Urinary calprotectin has been identified as a promising biomarker for acute kidney injury. To date, however, the time-dependent changes of this parameter during acute kidney injury remain elusive. The aim of the present work was to define the time-course of urinary calprotectin secretion after ischaemia/reperfusion-induced kidney injury in comparison to neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin, thereby monitoring the extent of tubular damage in nephron sparing surgery for kidney tumours. METHODS: The study population consisted of 42 patients. Thirty-two patients underwent either open or endoscopic nephron sparing surgery for kidney tumours. During the surgery, the renal arterial pedicle was clamped with a median ischaemic time of 13 minutes (interquartile range, 4.5-20.3 minutes) in 26 patients. Ten retro-peritoneoscopic living donor nephrectomy patients and 6 nephron sparing surgery patients in whom the renal artery was not clamped served as controls. Urinary calprotectin and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin concentrations were repeatedly measured by enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay and assessed according to renal function parameters. RESULTS: Urinary concentrations of calprotectin and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin increased significantly after ischaemia/reperfusion injury, whereas concentrations remained unchanged after nephron sparing surgery without ischaemia/reperfusion injury and after kidney donation. Calprotectin and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin levels were significantly increased 2 and 8 hours, respectively, post-ischaemia. Both proteins reached maximal concentrations after 48 hours, followed by a subsequent persistent decrease. Maximal neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin and calprotectin concentrations were 9-fold and 69-fold higher than their respective baseline values. The glomerular filtration rate was only transiently impaired at the first post-operative day after ischaemia/reperfusion injury (p = 0.049). CONCLUSION: Calprotectin and neutrophil gelatinase-associated lipocalin can be used to monitor clinical and sub-clinical tubular damage after nephron sparing surgery for kidney tumours. Urinary calprotectin concentrations start rising within 2 hours after ischaemia/reperfusion-induced kidney injury.