Figure 1

Illustration of the value of the severity score.Trajectory of estimated glomerular filtration rate (eGFR) of two hypothetical subjects of the same age with the same eGFR at the time of the study visit. Despite the similarity in their current kidney function, subject B’s course may have inflicted greater neurocognitive insult compared to that of subject A. This difference in clinical course is reflected in their Severity Scores (5 for subject B vs. 2 for subject A – see Table 5), but would be missed if we only considered current eGFR.