Nephrology News

Patients with chronic kidney disease who were not given pre-hydration prior to undergoing contrast-enhanced CT experienced outcomes similar to those who were given sodium bicarbonate pre-hydration, according to study results. This led researchers to conclude withholding pre-hydration is safe, as well as cost-effective.

Among patients with kidney failure and atrial fibrillation, racial/ethnic minorities were less likely to fill a prescription for warfarin and were more likely to experience stroke than white patients, according to a recently published study.

Patients of lower socioeconomic status, determined through area-level household income, had a greater incidence of both ANCA-related glomerulonephritis and lupus nephritis, according to study results from British Columbia, Canada.

Although Dutch patients who completed patient-reported outcome measures described high symptom burden and poor health-related quality of life, the overall response rate was low with considerable variation among dialysis centers, according to study results.

Uninsured patients with ESRD who visited Texas emergency departments for hemodialysis treatments contributed to high hospital costs and increased strain on the health care system, according to an analysis of 2017 statewide hospital data.

Less than half of currently used kidney disease quality metrics are “highly valid,” according to a structured metric evaluation review conducted by the American Society of Nephrology Quality Committee and subsequently published in JASN. This finding led Mallika L. Mendu, MD, MBA, of Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and colleagues to “advocate for refining existing measures and developing new metrics that better reflect the spectrum of kidney care delivery.”

Researchers from Australia found survival after kidney transplantation during childhood has improved significantly during the past 5 decades, with much of the improvement from reductions in cardiovascular- and infection-related deaths.

Patients on maintenance dialysis who experienced in-hospital cardiac arrest received similar quality of care, leading to comparable outcomes at discharge, to those not on dialysis, according to a recent study.

For dialysis access, the likelihood of arteriovenous fistula placement and subsequent maturation varied based on specific surgeon characteristics, according to this study.

Two key measures of sleep apnea — nocturnal hypoxemia and mean oxygen saturation — were associated with increased mortality risk for patients with advanced kidney disease, according to this study.