Rates of adverse clinical events in patients with chronic kidney disease: analysis of electronic health records from the UK clinical practice research datalink linked to hospital data

BACKGROUND: Further understanding of adverse clinical event rates in patients with chronic kidney disease (CKD) is required for improved quality of care. This study described baseline characteristics, adverse clinical event rates, and mortality risk in patients with CKD, accounting for CKD stage and dialysis status. METHODS: This retrospective, noninterventional cohort study included data from adults (aged ≥ 18 years) with two consecutive estimated glomerular filtration rates of < 60 ml/min/1.73 m(2), recorded ≥ 3 months apart, from the UK Clinical Practice Research Datalink of electronic health records obtained between January 1, 2004, and December 31, 2017. Select adverse clinical events, associated with CKD and difficult to quantify in randomized trials, were assessed; defined by Read codes and International Classification of Diseases, Tenth Revision codes. Clinical event rates were assessed by dialysis status (dialysis-dependent [DD], incident dialysis-dependent [IDD], or non–dialysis-dependent [NDD]), dialysis modality (hemodialysis [HD] or peritoneal dialysis [PD]), baseline NDD-CKD stage (3a–5), and observation period. RESULTS: Overall, 310,953 patients with CKD were included. Comorbidities were more common in patients receiving dialysis than in NDD-CKD, and increased with advancing CKD stage. Rates of adverse clinical events, particularly hyperkalemia and infection/sepsis, also increased with advancing CKD stage and were higher in patients on HD versus PD. Mortality risk during follow-up (1–5-year range) was lowest in patients with stage 3a NDD-CKD (2.0–18.5%) and highest in patients with IDD-CKD (26.3–58.4%). CONCLUSIONS: These findings highlight the need to monitor patients with CKD for comorbidities and complications, as well as signs or symptoms of clinical adverse events. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12882-023-03119-z.