A research study concluded recently under the leadership of Christian Schneider of the University of Cologne, Germany established this result with evidences of clinical trials.

CKD, as defined by a ‘Glomerular Filtration Rate (GFR)’ lower than 60 ml/min/1.73m2, is an independent risk factor for major CV events and death in diabetic patients, say Christian Schneider of the University of Cologne, Germany.

Christian Schneider and team at the University of Cologne ,analyzed data from the Prospective ‘Pioglitazone’ clinical trial in proactive macro-vascular events , which compared the effect of ‘Pioglitazone’ and ‘placebo’ in 5154 patients with Type 2 diabetes and macro-vascular disease.

Baseline analysis of the research findings show that out of the total 5154 patients nearly 597 participants, making a ratio of 11.6% , had ‘chronic kidney diseases’. These patients were older in age and had longer duration of diabetes with a higher prevalence of hypertension than those without chronic kidney diseases.

The study also pointed out that in comparison to those patients who did not have any chronic kidney diseases the patients with chronic kidney diseases were more likely to reach the primary composite end point of all related health problems. These could include mortality, myocardial infarction (MI), stroke, acute coronary syndrome, coronary and carotid arterial intervention, leg revascularization, or amputation above the ankle. The difference between the ratios of both the patients’ types was 27.5% to 19.6%.

Results obtained in the study do indicate similar trends on analysis in the way that the patients with chronic kidney diseases were also more likely to reach the secondary end point of all cause of mortality, MI, and stroke when compared to the patients with no chronic kidney diseases. In this case the difference existed with a ratio of 18.3% to the 11.5%.

Researchers observed that after treatment with ‘Pioglitazone’, only 23.7% and 14.6% of chronic kidney diseases patients met the primary and secondary end points, respectively. This is in comparison to the 30.7% and 21.4% of the patients who were treated with placebo.

It was observed by the researchers that the patients who were treated with ‘Pioglitazone’ showed considerable improvements in kidney functions. The results with these patients showed a reduction in estimated GFR of 0.8 ml/min/1.73m2/year, compared with the placebo group.

Christian Schneider and co-researchers concluded in their study report,”Patients who had CKD and were treated with pioglitazone were less likely to reach the composite end point of all-cause death, MI, and stroke, independent of the severity of renal impairment.”