LOS ANGELES, April 27 (Xinhua) -- People who experienced acute kidney injury (AKI) during hospitalization were more likely to revisit the hospital or die shortly after discharge, according to a new study published on Thursday.
AKI is a sudden loss of kidney function that usually lasts for a short time.
According to the study, supported by the U.S. National Institutes of Health, people who had been hospitalized with AKI, whether or not they had pre-existing kidney disease, were 62 percent more likely to be readmitted to the hospital for any reason and 266 percent more likely to die of any cause within 90 days after discharge from the hospital.
During the year following discharge, those hospitalized with AKI were rehospitalized nearly 60 percent more often than those hospitalized without AKI and more than twice as likely to die.
Heart failure, sepsis and pneumonia were among the most common causes for readmission after discharge with an AKI hospitalization, according to the study, published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases. ■