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Mercy Dialysis Center
The Effects of Severe Kidney Disease
Symptoms experienced by individuals with severe kidney disease include:
- Body size – decreased from muscle wasting or increased from fluid overload.
- Urinary flow rates – Usually decreased.
- Urinary ph – Usually increased.
- Nutritional state – Decreased due to:
- Lack of appetite
- Nausea and/or emesis
- Gastritis and bleeding
- Mouth sores
- Dietary restrictions
- Impaired Vitamin D metabolism (affects bones)
- Activity level – Decreased due to anemia and abnormal bone (calcium) synthesis (osteodystrophy).
- Pregnancy – Decreased due to infertility and altered menses
- Dysfunctional organ systems – Increased
- Psychologic state – Altered due to poor concentration, decreased mentation and altered perceptions.
- Body temperature – Decreased due to uremic toxins
What Happens If My Kidneys Fail Completely?
Healthy kidneys work 24 hours a day, seven days a week to keep our bodies in balance. When we eat and drink, the nutrients provided by our food goes into our blood to use as “fuel” to give us energy and keep us healthy. There also are unusable components in our food that our bodies must get rid of through our kidneys. The kidneys allow our bodies to keep the good things in our blood and get rid of the “waste” that we do not need. Our muscles also generate waste that the kidneys must remove.
If your kidneys stop working completely, your body fills with extra water and waste products. This condition is called uremia. Your hands or feet may swell. You will feel tired and weak because of the build up of wastes.
Untreated end-stage renal disease may lead to seizures or coma and will ultimately result in death. If your kidneys stop working completely, you will need to undergo dialysis or kidney transplant.
Treatment Options
As your kidney disease progresses, you will need to look at the treatment options and make decisions about what will work best for you. Dialysis is the method used to clean your blood when the kidneys do not work properly. Dialysis will help your body keep what it needs and get rid of what is not needed. Peritoneal dialysis and hemodialysis are the two different kinds of dialysis. These both clean the blood when healthy kidneys stop working.
If you are interested in a kidney transplant, you will be referred to a transplant center to evaluate if transplant is an option for you. Your doctor and health care team will help you choose the best treatment option for you.
Dialysis
The
two major forms of dialysis are hemodialysis and peritoneal dialysis.
In hemodialysis, your blood is sent through a machine that filters
away waste products. The clean blood is returned to your body. Hemodialysis
usually is performed at a dialysis center three times per week for
three or four hours.
In peritoneal dialysis, a fluid is put into your abdomen. This fluid, called dialysate, captures the waste products from your blood. After a few hours, the dialysate containing your body’s wastes is drained away. Then, a fresh bag of dialysate is dripped into the abdomen. Patients can learn to do this themselves without going to a doctor’s office each time. Patients using continuous ambulatory peritoneal dialysis (CPD), the most common form of peritoneal dialysis, change dialysate four times a day. Peritoneal dialysis also may be done at night by hooking up to a machine that does the dialysis.
Transplantation
Every
patient is evaluated for possible transplant. Not everyone will be
deemed a candidate based on a number of factors. The Mercy Dialysis
Center works with many facilities in providing information for a
transplant workup and evaluation. A donated kidney may come from
an anonymous donor who has recently died or from a living person,
usually a relative. The kidney that you receive must be a good match
for your body. The more the new kidney is like you, the less likely
your immune system is to reject it. Your immune system protects you
from disease by attacking anything that is not recognized as a normal
part of your body. So your immune system will attack a kidney that
appears too “foreign.” Special drugs can help trick your
immune system so it does not reject a transplanted kidney. If a family
member is interested in donating a kidney, there are a number of
tests they must go through before being considered a viable kidney
donor. We can initiate the workup through the facility of your choice.
We work with Iowa City, Des Moines, Rochester, the University of
Minnesota or any others you may want to consider. The waiting list
for a transplant from a non-living donor (cadaver) is approximately
2.5 years. There are a number of factors that may affect wait times.
Things to Consider When Looking at Treatment Options
You are part of an entire renal care team, which includes your doctor, your family, and other health care professionals such as a nurse practitioner, nurse, social worker and dietitian. Tap into their knowledge and experience.
There are several factors to think about when looking at treatment options:
- Medical condition
- Lifestyle
- Distance from a dialysis center
- Home setting
- Helper on hand
- Family support
- Emotional concerns
- Physical abilities
What Will the Future Bring?
As our understanding of the causes of kidney failure increases, so will our ability to predict and prevent these diseases. Recent studies have shown that intensive control of diabetes and high blood pressure can prevent or delay the onset of kidney disease.
In the area of genetics, researchers have located two genes that cause the most common form of PKD and are narrowing in on a third gene that causes a less common form. This new knowledge will be used in the search for effective therapies to prevent or treat PKD.
In the area of transplantation, new drugs to help the body accept foreign tissue increase the likelihood that a transplanted kidney will survive and function normally,. To combat the shortage of organs available for transplantation, scientists are exploring the possibility of using organs from animals. If this method is found to be medically feasible and ethically acceptable, the time a patient must wait for a usable kidney could be greatly reduced. In the distant future, scientists may develop an artificial kidney for implantation.
