Peritoneal dialysis is an important therapy for patients with Kidney Disease
when their kidneys can not work well. It can help the patients remove the
excessive water and wastes out of their bodies to alleviate their symptoms, but
it give rise to a series of complications at the same time.
1. Infection
One of the most serious complications of peritoneal dialysis is infection. It
can develop in the skin around the catheter or inside the abdominal cavity.
When the patients on peritoneal dialysis have infection on the catheter,
there will be redness, firmness of the skin around the infection site or
pus-like drainage from the area. If the patients have these symptoms they should
tell their doctors at once and receive timely treatments to deal with it. Cather
site infections are often treated with antibiotics. In addition, the patients on
peritoneal dialysis should clean the catheter site skin frequently to keep it
from bacterium, germ and so on. If the infection does not resolve with treatment
within one or two weeks, the catheter needs to be removed or replaced. The
patients should take relative measures with their doctors’ guidance and should
not do it freely by themselves.
When patients on peritoneal dialysis have peritonitis, they often have mild
or severe abdominal pain, fever, nausea and so on. The patients with peritonitis
need antibiotics in time. Left untreated, it may threaten patients’ life
seriously.
2. Hernia
Hernia is another common complication of peritoneal dialysis. It is caused by
the increased stress on the muscles of the abdomen, implantation of dialysis
catheter. If the patients on peritoneal dialysis are affected with hernia, they
often have swelling or mass in their abdomen. If they have these problems, they
should reflect them to their doctors in time. Generally speaking, if hernia is
serious, a surgery will be involved.
Peritoneal dialysis brings much pain to patients and disorders the patients’
routine life seriously. What’s more, it can not improve the patients’ renal
function at all. Therefore, the patients with Kidney Disease should receive
early effective treatments in early time so as to avoid dialysis. If you are
tormented by the above problems or you are a patient who wants to avoid
dialysis, you can get more information on our website.