Assessing interacting effects of albumin and phosphate in a time-dependent Cox model: Results of a prospective cohort study including incident dialysis patients

Background: Hypoalbuminemia and hyperphosphatemia have been shown to be strong predictors of mortality in chronic dialysis patients. Albumin and phosphate levels are closely related. However, evaluations on their combined relationship over time with survival outcomes over a long-term observation period in incident dialysis patients are sparse. Methods: We followed 235 incident dialysis patients in a prospective single-centre cohort study (INVOR-Study: Study of INcident Dialysis Patients in VORarlberg) applying a time-dependent Cox regression analysis using all measured laboratory values for up to more than seven…