Moderate-to-severe pruritus is common in patients with nondialysis CKD, according to a study published in the Clinical Journal of American Society of Nephrology. Kendra Wulczyn, MD, and colleagues included 1,951 participants with CKD without pruritus at baseline. A time-updated multivariable joint model was used to evaluate the associations of eGFR, patient clinical characteristics, and laboratory parameters with incident pruritus. Among participants, 34% developed incident moderate-to-severe pruritus over a median follow-up of 6 years. Among participants with more advanced CKD, a higher incidence rate was noted. The HR (95% CI) for pruritus linked with a 10 mL/min/1.73 m2 lower eGFR was 1.16 (1.10-1.23) as observed in multivariate models. A higher risk for incident pruritus was also linked with older age (≥65), diabetes, higher BMI, depressive symptoms, current smoking, opioid use, and serum parathyroid hormone. A lower risk (all P<0.05) was linked with low serum calcium (<9 mg/dL). Serum phosphate was not tied to incident pruritus in the primary analysis.
