Geographic Variation and US County Characteristics Associated With Rapid Kidney Function Decline

INTRODUCTION: Geographic variation in the prevalence of chronic kidney disease and incidence of end-stage renal disease has been previously reported. However, the geographic epidemiology of rapid estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) decline has not been examined. METHODS: We built a longitudinal cohort of 2,107,570 US veterans to characterize the spatial epidemiology of and examine the associations between US county characteristics and rapid eGFR decline. RESULTS: for heterogeneity < 0.001). Cohort participants had higher odds of rapid eGFR decline when living in counties with unfavorable characteristics in domains including health outcomes (odds ratio [OR] = 1.15; confidence interval [CI] = 1.09-1.22), health behaviors (OR = 1.08; CI = 1.03-1.13), clinical care (OR = 1.11; CI = 1.06-1.16), socioeconomic conditions (OR = 1.15; CI = 1.09-1.22), and physical environment (OR = 1.15; CI = 1.01-1.20); living in counties with high percentage of minorities and immigrants was associated with rapid eGFR decline (OR = 1.25; CI = 1.20-1.31). Spatial analyses suggest the presence of cluster of counties with high prevalence of rapid eGFR decline. DISCUSSION: Our findings show substantial geographic variation in rapid eGFR decline among US veterans; the variation persists in analyses stratified by diabetes and hypertension status; results show associations between US county characteristics in domains capturing health, socioeconomic, environmental, and diversity conditions, and rapid eGFR decline.