Vanderbilt investigators have demonstrated in two studies that metformin-based treatments delay the onset and progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD) compared with other treatments for diabetes.

In an observational study by researchers at Vanderbilt University Medical Center, adults with type 2 diabetes who take insulin in addition to the recommended first-line drug therapy, metformin, had a 30 percent higher risk of heart attack, stroke or death when compared to similar patients who instead augment their metformin regimen with a sulfonylurea.

Dan Roden, M.D., assistant vice chancellor for Personalized Medicine, has been appointed to the National Advisory Council for Human Genome Research of the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

A new study estimates that tobacco smoking has been linked to approximately 2 million deaths among adult men and women in Asia in recent years and predicts a rising death toll.

Kidney disease is the eighth most common cause of death in the United States and affects more than 20 million people, yet many people don’t know they have kidney disease because it often develops very slowly and with minimal symptoms. For this reason, kidney disease is often referred to as a silent killer.

A particular anti-arrhythmia drug provides a targeted treatment for certain forms of atrial fibrillation.

Vanderbilt University Medical Center, committed to providing multiple options to patients who have kidney disease, recently began offering nocturnal in-center hemodialysis, which allows patients to receive treatment at night while they sleep.