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Newswise BIRMINGHAM, Ala. A gradual loss of kidney function over time or chronic kidney disease (CKD) increases the risk of heart disease and stroke. Two sets of cholesterol-treatment guidelines published in 2013 inform the decision to use statins.
One set is specifically for patients with CKD, while the other is for the general population. University of Alabama at Birmingham experts compared them to find similarities and differences and to also determine if CKD patients are taking statins unnecessarily.
Around 26 million adults in the United States have CKD, according to the National Kidney Foundation, and heart disease and stroke are major causes of death among them.
In Contrasting Cholesterol Management Guidelines for Adults with CKD, published in the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology, UAB School of Public Health investigators compared the American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association cholesterol treatment guideline and the Kidney Disease Improving Global Outcomes Foundation Clinical Practice Guideline for Lipid Management in CKD.
Study lead author Lisandro Colantonio, M.D., doctoral candidate in the UAB Department of Epidemiology, said the two guidelines target different populations in treatment recommendations.
The ACC/AHA guideline is aimed toward statin treatment decisions for the general population, while the KDIGO guideline is intended to guide treatment of patients with kidney disease, Colantonio said.
The ACC/AHA guideline recommends statin treatment to individuals with a high risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD; heart disease or stroke) based on a history of CVD, diabetes or an estimated 10-year risk 7.5 percent using the Pooled Cohorts risk equations. The KDIGO guideline recommends statin therapy for all people ages 50-79 with CKD.
While most patients with CKD are at high risk for CVD, we hypothesized that some patients with CKD are not at high risk and therefore may be unnecessarily recommended statins by the KDIGO guideline, Colantonio said. Therefore, we felt it was important to understand in what ways the two cholesterol-treatment recommendations are similar and how they may be different.
Read more:
Guidelines Agree: Most Patients with Chronic Kidney Disease Should Take Statins