Health And Medical Doctrine

Choosing a treatment for your kidney disease can be very difficult. Even if you have opted for a kidney transplant, you will still need to go through months, and possibly years, of dialysis. There are two types of dialysis, depending on what you want to opt for but this will cover Peritoneal Dialysis.

Peritoneal Dialysis for Kidney Disease

This is a procedure that helps to remove the waste and extra fluids that have built up in your body due to you kidneys no longer functioning correctly. You use the abdomen lining so that you can filter your blood, acting as a temporary kidney. This is only a temporary form of treatment and cannot be used as a cure.

How Peritoneal Dialysis Treats Kidney Disease

The dialysis is a mixture of sugars and minerals that are dissolved in water. This is used to pull the waste and excess fluid into your abdomen lining, which is where the solution stays.

The solution is the drained from your body and back through the tube and takes the waste with it. This is done over several hours. The process then works again, depending on your doctor’s orders.

You need to have a catheter placed into your abdomen first for the dialysis to work. This is usually done up to three weeks prior to starting treatment and has to be done by a surgeon. The wound needs to heal properly for the dialysis to work as it should. This catheter remains in the body until dialysis is not longer needed.

Continuous Ambulatory Peritoneal Dialysis for Kidney Disease

There are two types of peritoneal dialysis and the first is CAPD. This can be done anywhere that is clean and well-lit since there is no need for a machine. The waste passes from a plastic bag and it stays in your body for a few hours. This process works while you are continuing with your daily life until it is time to drain the solution.

Again, this is done with a plastic bag, which the solution is passed into. You are able to then repeat the process again. This is usually done around four times a day and you do not need to wake up at night as the solution can stay in your body for six hours or more.

Continuous Cycler-Assisted Peritoneal Dialysis for Kidney Disease

Rather than being able to do this wherever you want, this is done at a machine, which empties and fills your abdomen with the same solution. This is all done while you are sleep, usually around five times, and then during the day you have the same clean solution in your abdomen; it works the whole day. Some patients do an exchange of the fluids during the middle of the day but it is not necessary.

For those that weight over 175 pounds, it is possible to combine the two treatments. This can either be done with the normal CAPD procedure with a mini cycler for CCPD at night or with the normal CCPD procedure with a single exchange during the day.

Complications of Peritoneal Dialysis for Kidney Disease

The main problem that this treatment causes is the abdominal infection. This is usually due to the incision, where the catheter was placed, becoming infected.

There are antibiotic treatments available and there is also a possibility of having the catheter in the chest, which is less at risk of infections.

It can be avoided easily by sticking to the procedure correctly and knowing the early signs so that you can be treated as soon as possible.