Blood pressure measures and risk of chronic kidney disease in men

Abstract

Background: High blood pressure (BP) has been associated with a decrease in kidney function. However, it remains unclear which BP measure best predicts impaired kidney function.

Methods: We compared systolic blood pressure (SBP), diastolic blood pressure (DBP), pulse pressure (PP) and mean arterial pressure (MAP) in predicting risk of chronic kidney disease (CKD). We prospectively followed 8093 male participants in the Physicians' Health Study, without a known history of kidney disease at baseline, who provided BP values on the baseline and 24-month questionnaires, and for whom we had creatinine measures after 14 years of follow-up. Reported BP was averaged from both questionnaires. The main outcome was CKD, defined as an estimated glomerular filtration rate <60 mL/min/1.73 m(2). We used multivariable-adjusted logistic regression to evaluate the association between BP measures and CKD and compared models using the likelihood ratio test.

Results: After 14 years of follow-up, 1039 men (12.8%) had CKD. An increase of 10 mmHg had corresponding multivariable-adjusted odds ratios (95% confidence intervals) of 1.11 (1.03-1.19) for SBP, 1.11 (1.00-1.23) for MAP, 1.14 (1.05-1.25) for PP and 1.05 (0.93-1.17) for DBP. SBP and PP were the strongest predictors of chronic kidney function, with equal predictive abilities. Combining BP measures did not add significantly to the prediction.

Conclusions: Increases in SBP, PP and MAP were significantly associated with CKD. SBP may be the most clinically useful predictor of CKD, since no further calculations are required.