Clinical support tool helps primary care health professionals detect and treat chronic kidney disease

Investigators have developed and validated a clinical decision support tool to improve the diagnosis and treatment of chronic kidney disease (CKD) at the point of care. The research will be presented at ASN Kidney Week 2026 October 22–25.

Called Treat CKD, the tool draws on electronic health records data to identify CKD, classify risk by Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes criteria, calculate kidney failure risk using the Kidney Failure Risk Equation, estimate cardiovascular risk using American Heart Association PREVENT equations, and provide recommendations for albuminuria testing, blood pressure management, cholesterol-lowering therapy, cardio-kidney therapies, and nephrology referral.

When incorporated into the University of California, San Francisco’s system, primary care health care professionals described it as easy to use, clinically relevant, and well-integrated into workflows without adding substantial workflow burden.

Treat CKD accurately confirmed Kidney Disease: Improving Global Outcomes-based CKD risk classification and was fully concordant with the manually calculated Kidney Failure Risk Equation and PREVENT risk scores.

“Treat CKD accurately automates CKD identification and risk classification, estimates risk of cardiovascular events and progression to kidney failure, and provides guideline-concordant treatment recommendations for primary care, while being perceived by clinicians as easy to use, acceptable, and clinically appropriate for routine use in primary care, supporting its further evaluation as a scalable CKD detection and treatment strategy,” said corresponding author Ivan Villasenor, an MD candidate at the University of California San Francisco School of Medicine.

Study: “Treat CKD: An Electronic Health Record (EHR)-Integrated Clinical Decision Support Tool for Risk-Based CKD Care in Primary Care”