Comorbidity and other factors associated with modality selection in incident dialysis patients: the CHOICE Study. Choices for Healthy Outcomes in Caring for End-Stage Renal Disease.

Case-mix factors influence both the selection of dialysis modality and outcomes in end-stage renal disease (ESRD). A detailed characterization of the case-mix differences between peritoneal dialysis (PD) and hemodialysis (HD) patients at the onset of dialysis therapy has not been performed, despite the importance of accounting for baseline differences in future comparisons of outcomes across modality groups. We compared baseline characteristics of 279 PD and 759 HD patients enrolled in the Choices for Healthy Outcomes in Caring for End-Stage Renal Disease (CHOICE) Cohort Study, a prospective study of incident dialysis patients.