Serum glycated albumin predicts all-cause mortality in dialysis patients with diabetes mellitus: meta-analysis and systematic review of a predictive biomarker

Background and Aim HbA1c, the traditional and current gold standard biomarker guiding diabetic management, has been scrutinized for low predictive value for patients with chronic kidney disease due to variables affecting erythrocyte number and turnover. Glycated albumin, the precursor to advanced glycation end products, reflects glycemic status over the preceding 2-3 week period and already outperforms HbA1c for glycemic monitoring. Our aim was to establish whether serum GA can be further used to predict mortality risk in dialysis patients with diabetes mellitus (DM) Methods We did systematic review of the literature in PubMed/Medline, Web of Science, Embase (Elsevier) and the Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials (Wiley) up to and including February 2020. Results This meta-analysis included 25,932 dialysis patients across 12 studies with maximum follow-up of 11 years. Higher GA levels were associated with the risk of all-cause mortality in dialysis patients with DM (HR 1.02, 95% CI 1.01 to 1.03,P < 0.001) irrespective of the type of dialysis, whereas higher GA was not associated with cardiovascular mortality (HR 1.03, 95% CI 0.99 to 1.06,P = 0.15) and cardiovascular events (both fatal and non-fatal) (HR 1.03, 95% CI 0.97 to 1.09,P = 0.31) in dialysis patients with DM. Conclusion Serum glycated albumin predicts all-cause mortality risk in dialysis patients with DM. The endpoints of cardiovascular mortality and cardiovascular events trended similarly, but did not reach significance at the current sample size.