Tests are conducted to assess how well the kidneys filter out creatinine from the body around 290 million times a year.

The research, published in the Lancet Diabetes and Endocrinology, indicates that the common kidney tests could predict the risk of conditions such as heart failure,stroke and heart attacks.

“If health care providers have data on kidney damage and kidney function – which they often do – they should be using those data to better understand a patient’s risk of cardiovascular disease,” says Dr. Kunihiro Matsushita, an assistant scientist in the Bloomberg School’s Department of Epidemiology and lead author of the study.

Patients with chronic kidney disease are twice as likely to develop cardiovascular disease than those whose kidneys are healthy. According to the authors of the study, roughly half of patients with chronic kidney disease die of cardiovascular disease before developing end-stage renal disease.

Dr. Matsushita explains that while traditionally-used cholesterol levels and blood pressure tests are good indicators of cardiovascular risk, they are not perfect. “This study tells us we could do even better with information that often times we are already collecting.”

Two key tests that help define and stage chronic kidney disease identified by the researchers are those that check the blood for creatinine and those that measure the amount of albumin in the urine.

Creatinine is a waste product of the muscles and the amount of it that is in the blood indicates how well the kidneys are filtering it out of the body. Testing how well the kidneys are filtering it out – referred to as an estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) – is carried out an estimated 290 million times annually in the US.

Albumin is a protein that leaks out of the kidney into the urine. If there are high amounts of this protein present then it is likely that the patient has kidney damage. Measuring albuminuria is also common in the US, particularly among patients with diabetes and hypertension.

According to the authors of the study, the data provided by these tests could help physicians when making decisions about forms of treatment such as statins, or whether patients need lifestyle interventions such as improved diets and exercise.