Research Article Peripheral Arterial Stiffness Is Independently Associated with a Rapid Decline in Estimated Glomerular Filtration Rate in

Copyright © 2013 Yi-Jing Sheen et al. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Introduction. Diabetes and its vascular complications are main noncommunicable chronic diseases and major global health issues. Peripheral arterial disease (PAD) is highly prevalent in diabetes with nephropathy. We evaluated the associations of variables of arterial stiffness and the decline in estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) in patients with type 2 diabetes. Materials and Methods. A total of 577 type 2 diabetic patients (mean±SD: age, 63±11 years) were enrolled. A rapid decline in eGFRwas defined as progressively lower eGFR detected at both the 6- and 12-month follow-up visits, plus a reduction in eGFRmore than 3mL⋅min−1pe