Awareness, self-management behaviors, health literacy and kidney function relationships in specialty practice

To determine the relationship between chronic kidney disease (CKD) awareness (CKD-A), self-management behaviors (CKD-SMB) knowledge, performance of CKD-SMBs, health literacy (HL) and kidney function.

Participants were eligible patients attending an outpatient nephrology clinic. Participants were administered: Newest Vital Sign to measure HL, CKD self-management knowledge tool (CKD-SMKT) to assess knowledge, past performance of CKD-SMB, CKD-A. Estimated GFR (eGFR) was determined using the MDRD-4 equation. Duration of clinic participation and CKD cause were extracted from medical charts.

One-hundred-fifty patients participated in the study. eGFRs ranged from 17-152 mL/min per 1.73 m². Majority (83%) of respondents had stage 3 or 4 CKD, low HL (63%), and were CKD aware (88%). Approximately 40% (10/25) of patients in stages 1 and 2 and 6.4% (8/125) in stages 3 and 4 were unaware of their CKD. CKD-A differed with stage (P < 0.001) but not by HL level, duration of clinic participation, or CKD cause. Majority of respondents (≥ 90%) correctly answered one or more CKD-SMKT items. Knowledge of one behavior, "controlling blood pressure" differed significantly by CKD-A. CKD-A was associated with past performance of two CKD-SMBs, "controlling blood pressure" (P = 0.02), and "keeping healthy body weight" (P = 0.01). Adjusted multivariate analyses between CKD-A and: (1) HL; and (2) CKD-SMB knowledge were non-significant. However, there was a significant relationship between CKD-A and kidney function after controlling for demographics, HL, and CKD-SMB (P < 0.05).

CKD-A is not associated with HL, or better CKD-SMBs. CKD-A is significantly associated with kidney function and substantially lower eGFR, suggesting the need for focused patient education in CKD stages 1.