Relationship of uric acid and uric acid to creatinine ratio with reduced glomerular filtration rate in non-alcoholic fatty liver disease among apparently healthy adults

Objective: The objective was to explore the potential existence and nature of the relationship between serum of uric acid (SUA) and serum uric acid to serum creatinine ratio (SUA/SCr) with reduced estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) in patients with non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD). Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among apparently healthy subjects with NAFLD (n=485). The association between tertiles of SUA and SUA/SCr with reduced eGFR (n=56) were investigated after adjustments for potentially relevant confounders. Also, the diagnostic performances of SUA and SUA/SCr were evaluated with the receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve analysis. Results: In the adjusted models, SUA showed a significant positive association with reduced eGFR in the highest tertile (OR 5.65, 95% CI 2.48-12.86, p<0.001), and SUA/SCr, in the lowest tertile (4.21, 95% CI 1.76-10.07, p=0.001). The ROC curve analysis did not reveal any significant difference between the corresponding values of area under the curve for SUA and SUA/SCr (0.70 and 0.67, respectively; p=0.521). Conclusions: We revealed significant and independent associations of elevated SUA and reduced SUA/SCr with kidney function decline in NAFLD. However, the clinical utility of these two biomarkers seemed to be limited for the mentioned purpose and needs further investigations.