Patients with moderate to severe chronic kidney disease may be at increased risk of developing aortic stenosis, according to results from the Swedish SCREAM project.

Previous studies have shown that patients undergoing dialysis have an increased prevalence of aortic stenosis, but evidence linking chronic kidney disease with the risk of aortic stenosis has been inconsistent.

This new finding could prompt doctors to intensify cardioprevention strategies in these patients, such as encouraging greater lifestyle modification, prescribing statins and closer monitoring for cardiovascular risk factors, says lead author Dr Georgios Vavilis from the Karolinska Institutein in Stockholm.

Dr Vavilis and colleagues used data from more than 1.1 million participants in the Stockholm CREAtinine Measurement (SCREAM) project to investigate whether kidney dysfunction was associated with the incidence of aortic stenosis.