EPO and Stroke: In the placebo-controlled and double-blind trial of darbepoetin for type 2 diabetes and CKD (TREAT) conducted by Pfeffer et al. (2009) the stroke rate in the high-hemoglobin group was 5.0% in patients with CKD and 2.6% in the placebo group, indicating that the risks associated with treating patients with a history of stroke with EPO are considerable.