MAYWOOD, Ill. -- For kidney disease patients, a large belt size can double the risk of dying.
A study lead by a Loyola University Health System researcher found that the larger a kidney patient's waist circumference, the greater the chance the patient would die during the course of the study.
The study by lead researcher Holly Kramer, MD, MPH, and colleagues is published in the American Journal of Kidney Diseases.
Waist circumference was more strongly linked to mortality than another common measure of obesity, body mass index (BMI).