Complications of hemodialysis

General

This text will talk about a procedure called hemodialysis and somecomplications that can arise from this procedure, which is used in orderto remove waste products from the blood. This is usually done when there is adanger for the kidneys in the form of renal failure. The most common wasteproducts eliminated are urea and creatinine. There are three possible renalreplacement therapies and hemodialysis is one of them. There are two ways in which hemodialysis can be done. It can be done at home which is done very rarely and more often in the hospital. When the procedure is done in the hospital,it can be performed in the stand alone clinic or hospital's room for thispurpose. Wherever this procedure is done somebody has to monitor it.In hospital this will be the staff and at home some trained individual must bepresent.

Complications

Usually when hemodialysis is performed the fluid is removed from the body. Thisis done since many patients who suffer from renal failure pass no or verylittle urine. There are some problems which can happen when fluid is extracted and they include chest pain, low blood pressure, headache, fatigue, nausea and crampsin the legs. These problems have a popular name, which is dialysis hangover, and they can occur after or during the treatment. The size of theproblem with fluid removal will determine the strength of these symptoms. Someof the ways to prevent this problem is to drink plenty of fluid between thetreatments and perform dialysis more often. Another possible problem ismicrobes that can enter the circulatory system and bone andheart valves infection, sepsis and bleeding are these problems.

A medicinecalled heparin is usually used along with hemodialysis, because it is ananticoagulant. But sometimes an allergy can occur because of this medicine, while lowcount of platelet can follow this problem. There are several possiblesubstitutes for the heparin. There is a possibility of an anaphylactic reaction dueto the artificial kidney, and the problems experienced due to this include chest pain,wheezing, breath shortness, sneezing, back pain and even death. Residualsterilant can cause this problem. The name for this problem is first usesyndrome. This problem was very great in the past, but since the medicine hasadvanced, number of these problems has been shortened significantly over the years. Some of the problems which can arise from hemodialysis which arelong-term, are neuropathy, amyloidosis and several conditions involving heart.