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. 2017 May 18;12(6):955–964. doi: 10.2215/CJN.12181116

Figure 2.

Figure 2.

Study cohort derivation. In the Dialysis Outcomes and Practice Patterns Study (DOPPS) I–IV, 15,158 participants received hemodialysis (HD) for 180 days or less at study entry (days since DOPPS entry =0) and did not receive peritoneal dialysis (PD) or a kidney transplant before HD. Of these, 6119 met our eligibility criteria of having received their first permanent vascular access (VA; a fistula, a graft, or a tunneled catheter) between 15 days before DOPPS entry and 180 days after DOPPS entry. We established these criteria to minimize survivorship bias and misclassification bias (rates of recorded complications were lower when the access was placed earlier relative to DOPPS entry). Although we excluded from main analyses the people who received their first permanent VA between 15 and 180 days before DOPPS entry (n=7744), we included them in sensitivity analyses.