Assessment of biochemical and hematological changes in dialysis patients in Najd, Saudi Arabia a four-year experience

ABSTRACT

This study was performed on 50 patients with end stage renal disease. They included 15 patients with diabetic nephropathy, 15 patients with glomerulonephritis, 15 patients with hypertensive nephropathy, 2 patient with systemic lupus erythematosus and the remaining 3 patients, one had tuberculous pyelonephritis, one had sickle cell haemoglobinopathy and one had myelomatosis. These patients were treated with dialysis, 10 patients subjected to intermittent peritoneal dialysis and 40 patients were treated with haemodialysis twice weekly and were followed up for 4 years. Blood urea, serum creatinine, sodium, potassium, phosphorus, uric acid, calcium, magnesium, liver function tests and blood glucose together with full blood picture, platelet count and blood group were done for every patients before and after every dialysis for four years. Hepatitis B surface antigen was done for every patient. It was found that peritoneal dialysis was better than haemodialysis in treatment of these patients as evidenced by biochemical and hematological data. Anaemia was present in all patients but this was not grossly affected by dialysis. A nonsignificant increase in platelet count was observed after peritoneal dialysis while a nonsignificant decrease was observed after haemodialysis. All the patients were Rhesus positive, 58% of them were group 0. No more seroconversion for hepatitis B occurred during the four years of the study. Arthropathy was recorded in 4% of our cases. There were two fatalities during the period of the study, one due to cancer colon and the other due to non-Hodglin's lymphoma